Morality, Religion & Philosophy: February 2005 Archives

On Sunday my pastor noted that, "Some people will believe anything, as long as it's not written in the Bible."

Why is that? There are three main reasons that I can think of, though you may come up with more.

First, Christians are often not very good representatives of what the Bible teaches. All sorts of evils have been done because "God told me to", so many unbelievers are wary of putting their faith in a document that's been clearly misused and misconstrued over the ages.

Second, most people don't know a lot about what the Bible says. Even many Christians know very little of what God has written, or only know Bible soundbites ("Love your neighbor as yourself", "Thou shalt not X"). This plays into the first reason: Christians often don't follow God's commands because they don't know God's commands; unbelievers only know a very little of what the Bible says, but they know a great deal about the silly, hypocritical things Christians do. I can't even count the number of times I've had unbelievers tell me that they don't want to be a Christian because of something they think they know about the Bible, but that in fact is completely false.

Third, most people don't like the message of the Bible. This dislike is natural -- all people are evil in their hearts and love themselves more than God -- and it often leads to both disobedience and ignorance of the Bible. Why study something that clashes so uncomfortably with the enjoyable lifestyle you crave? Why obey in hard circumstances when it is (apparently) so easy to get away with doing wrong? Much better to just forget about it and secretly hope that ignorance will be a suitable excuse when -- and if -- God ever gets around to judging people.

And the consequence of these three factors is that the Bible has been largely discredited in our culture. When telling someone about God, saying "because it's written in the Bible" carries very little weight. People reject the idea of faith and belief and instead clamor for proof, which is impossible to produce, because God is not a tangible thing that can be boxed in by theorems and logic. Further, the actions of Christians often don't demonstrate a God that is worthy of faith.

Nevertheless, Christians shouldn't forget that when Jesus confronted Satan directly, his most powerful weapon were three simple words: "it is written".

Xrlq pointed me to a thread at Hugo Schwyzer's blog about Bible versions and submission as commanded in Ephesians 5. The comment thread is very interesting, but they get stuck because the only options they consider are that the passage is misconstrued and that it doesn't really mean that wives should submit to their husbands, or that the passage is nonsense and demonstrates that the Bible is stupid and sexist. However, as I wrote regarding marriage and submission previously, the reason secularists and politically correct Christians don't understand the passage is because they don't see how it can be both "sexist" and good at the same time.

First, Xrlq argues that it's absurd for the Bible to say that a wife should worship her husband just as the church worships Christ. That would be absurd, so it's good the Bible doesn't say that. It only says that a wife is supposed to submit her husband as the church submits to Christ. That submission is based on the wife's reverence for Christ, not based on the magnificence of the husband. Further, the husband is commanded to live his wife just as Christ loved the church, not because the wife is super-fantastic, but because of the husband's reverence for Christ. Our worship of God dictates our relationships to our fellow human beings.

Second, the real controversy seems to be based on the belief that the one who submits is somehow "less" than the one in authority. As I quoted in my previous post, that's just not the case. Jesus himself taught on the matter of authority and said:

Luke 22:24-27

24 Also a dispute arose among them as to which of them was considered to be greatest. 25 Jesus said to them, "The kings of the Gentiles lord it over them; and those who exercise authority over them call themselves Benefactors. 26 But you are not to be like that. Instead, the greatest among you should be like the youngest, and the one who rules like the one who serves. 27 For who is greater, the one who is at the table or the one who serves? Is it not the one who is at the table? But I am among you as one who serves."

Jesus came to earth to submit to evil men and be killed, not to rule as a king. Anyone who worries about being in charge and having earthly authority reveals that they care more for worldly things than spiritual. Humility should guide both husbands and wives in everything. Each should love the other, and each should submit to the other, but special instruction is given here to each partner to teach them what manner of behavior is pleasing to God. Anyone who knows both men and women can attest that we are different, so it should be no surprise that God treats us differently in marriage.

Finally, perhaps more husbands should strive to be worthy of submission, and perhaps more wives should strive to be worth dying for.

Updated Below

There isn't a lot of data about why women have abortions, but much of the vehement opposition to abortion restrictions focuses on the argument that some abortions are necessary to protect the life and health of the mother. That is true. But what percentage of abortions are performed for health reasons? The Georgia Right to Life website quotes a report by the Alan Guttmacher Institute with the following statistics.

In recognition of this public opposition, abortion providers rarely provide data on the reasons women have abortions. But little has changed since the breakdown shown below provided in 1987 by the Alan Guttmacher Institute, an affliate of Planned Parenthood. Abortions of healthy babies by healthy mothers account for over 90% of the estimated 1.3 million abortions done yearly.

Too expensive (21%)
Not ready (21%)
Big change (16%)
Relationships (12%)
Enough children (11%)
Not mature (8%)
Other reasons (4%)
Mother's health (3%)
Baby's health (3%)
Rape/incest (1%)

According to the women who received abortions and answered this survey, only 7% of abortions are performed for the reasons with the most popular support.

Polls, however, continue to find little support for the majority of these abortions. Two National polls, Zogby in November 2002 and Wirthlin in December 2002, found almost identical results: 61 and 62 percent, respectively, believed that abortion should never be allowed or allowed only in cases of rape, incest, or to protect the life of the mother. Only 37 and 35 percent, respectively, thought abortion should always be legal or allowed for other reasons. And the Wirthlin poll offered this important clarification: of the 35 percent who thought abortion should always be legal, 22 percent would limit abortion to the first three months of pregnancy.

So why not ban the other 93% of abortions and save all those lives?

Update:
The comments here are very good. I don't think women should be executed for having illegal abortions, but I do think they should serve prison time -- and I do think the punishment for having an "abortion of convenience" should include sterilization.

Yesterday my pastor mentioned an experiment by a psychologist named Walter Mitchell, as described by Daniel Goleman in his book Emotional Intelligence, in which a group of four-year-olds are set in a room around a table and each one is given a marshmallow. The experimenter tells the children that they can each eat their marshmallow once he leaves the room, but if they wait till he gets back then he'll give a second marshmallow to those who waited. As described on this page about emotional intelligence:

After fourteen years, the psychologists tracked the children and tested them. The differences were dramatic. Those who resisted temptation were more confident and motivated and better able to cope with the frustrations of life. In addition, their academic results suggested that the ability to delay gratification contributes powerfully to intellectual potential.

Self-control is the key to much success and happiness in life, and one of the keys to self-control is learning to take pleasure in making good choices. A person may not think that vegetables taste good, but there's more to eating than just the pleasure of tasting food; the way we eat will have long term consequences on our health and happiness that we can't forsee in the present. However, if we condition ourselves to take pride in making good choices, we can trick ourselves into enjoying vegetables because we're doing what's right.

The same strategy works for coercing ourselves to do all sorts of things we don't want to do. We use our minds to create purely mental rewards for behaviors that don't have immediately tangible benefits. Abstaining from sex may not feel like a fun thing to do at certain times, but if we invest ourselves in a moral code that values chastity then we can take righteous pleasure in denying our carnal lusts. We tell ourselves that there will be negative consequences in the future if we indulge ourselves now -- and that is often true -- and we encourage ourselves to enjoy the prospect of avoiding those future hurts. But the immediate reward is entirely within our heads.

Many on both the left and right bark much more loudly than they bite. For an example from the left, consider Susan at Suburban Guerrilla who feels complicit in President Bush's "horror" and yet does nothing about it.

Does the knowledge of impending evil require action on a moral person's part?

Well, does it?

You already know the answer, I suspect. That's why so many of us have been so edgy since the Bush takeover, why so many of our fellow citizens cling so fiercely to their state of denial. No one wants to acknowledge the full extent of what's going on, because if you actually let it sink in, you might feel morally compelled to run into the streets with an AK-47. And that would certainly disrupt our comfortable lives, wouldn't it?

I was reading the other day that one of the Nazi torture warehouses was right in the middle of a residential neighborhood - right next to a movie theater, in fact. People must have heard the screams.

On some level, weren't they complicit? Did pretending they didn't know repel the moral stain?

Stephen King novels are easier for us to absorb than real life, because we assume we'd fight back against unthinkable horrors like vampires or evil clowns. Frankly, it would be an easier decision than fighting back against a right-wing coup - it's more visible, easier to label.

I mean, you don't see me out in the streets, calling for revolution. I'm not saying I'm any different than you, or morally superior. I'm saying as long as we're not out in the streets, storming the barricades to stop the horrors performed in our name, we're part of those horrors.

She's not much different from the pro-lifers (such as myself) who consider most abortions to be murder and yet sit by, mostly passive, while nearly a million babies are killed each year. So are we cowards? I don't think so.

What I think is that when people speak to advocate change, they're willing to go farther in words than they will in deeds because they hope to sway the deeds of others only slightly towards their favor; deeds are not necessary to inspire such a small shift. Along the same lines, people may realize that there's little to be gained by pushing an issue beyond a certain point. Susan (and pro-lifers) can advocate for a belief with words at very little cost; going further, into deeds, will begin to endanger their comfort and security. It would be irrational to court such danger without the reasonable expectation of additionally benefiting the belief being advocated -- great cost, for no additional gain other than the smugness that comes from moral consistency.

Gregg Easterbrook has an odd proposal to solve the various Ten Commandment lawsuits. He claims that there would be no Constitutional issue if Christians were willing to compromise and focus on the six commandments that Mr. Easterbrook believes Jesus valued most. However, Mr. Easterbrook apparently misunderstands the essence of the passage that he uses to illustrate his point.

Yet there is an alternative to the Ten Commandments--namely, the Six Commandments, enunciated by Jesus himself. And the Six Commandments could hang in any public facility without jeopardizing the separation of church and state.

In the Gospel of Matthew, a man asks Jesus what a person must do to enter heaven. He answers: "Keep the commandments." The man inquires: "Which ones?" Here is how the biblical account continues: "And Jesus said, 'You shall not murder; you shall not commit adultery; you shall not steal; you shall not bear false witness. Honor your father and mother. Also, you shall love your neighbor as yourself.'"

Debating what laws are more important than others was a long-standing exercise of the rabbinical tradition in which Jesus was educated. But in these verses, which have a parallel retelling in the Gospel of Mark, Christ is not merely offering an opinion about law. Something wholly remarkable happens--Jesus edits the commandments.

Quickly now, which commandments did he leave out? "You shall have no other gods before me. You shall not make for yourselves an idol. You shall not make wrongful use of the name of the Lord your God. Remember the Sabbath Day, and keep it holy." These are the commandments having to do with formal religious observance--from today's perspective, the ones that clash with the Establishment Clause. Jesus' Six Commandments make no mention of God or faith. They could be posted on public property without constitutional entanglements.

Mr. Easterbrook very conveniently decides not to include the entirity of the account to which he is referring, which can be found here:

Matthew 19:16-22

Now a man came up to Jesus and asked, “Teacher, what good thing must I do to get eternal life?”

“Why do you ask me about what is good?” Jesus replied. “There is only One who is good. If you want to enter life, obey the commandments.”

“Which ones?” the man inquired.

Jesus replied, “ ‘Do not murder, do not commit adultery, do not steal, do not give false testimony, honor your father and mother,’ and ‘love your neighbor as yourself.’”

“All these I have kept,” the young man said. “What do I still lack?”

Jesus answered, “If you want to be perfect, go, sell your possessions and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven. Then come, follow me.”

When the young man heard this, he went away sad, because he had great wealth.

It should be obvious that Jesus wasn't dismissing the first four commandments; rather, he mentioned the latter six to the man first in order to set him up to face what was really hindering the man's spiritual journey. The questioning man apparently did very well obeying the commandments that instructed him in his relationships with his fellow men, but when Jesus told him to sell his goods and follow the questioner could not. Why? Because he was very rich and he had made his wealth into an idol. The rich young ruler was right with men, but he was not right with God, and when Jesus pointed this out to him he left, sad. The man knew what he had to do to fix his relationship with God, and yet he refused because of his idolatry -- which is, of course, a violation of the First and Second Commandments.

Mr. Easterbrook appears to have constructed a false God for himself, as well. Jesus did, in fact, de-emphasize the formalities of worship (particularly the forms with which the ancient Jews were familiar), but he certainly never condoned idolatry and blasphemy (remember when he cleansed the temple?). To suggest otherwise is, itself, blasphemous.

Justin Katz posts a long article on his site that appeared in the December 31, 2004, issue of National Review titled "One Man's Marriage Trap" in which he discusses and dissects Andrew Sullivan's position on same-sex marriage. It's an interesting read, since Mr. Sullivan tends to be one of the more rational and consistent voices in favor of changing the institution (as insufferable as he is).