Why should thoughtful Christians reject Donald Trump’s “God Bless the USA” Bible? Four reasons leap to mind:
And that’s all I’ve got to say about that.
– B. Casey, 4/8/24, 2:00 p.m. (when the eclipse was supposed to be happening where I am, but I guess I missed it)
The relatively uncommon name “Ruth” tends to conjure up good thoughts. Over on my other blog, I have just shared thoughts on the lineage of two women named Ruth—1) the Ruth of old, in the time of the “Judges,” and 2) my own grandmother. I haven’t known many Ruths, and the biblical one is actually the only one in more than two millennia of biblical history.
Not only does the story have specially named characters; it also provides an especially incisive opportunity to consider the narrative of God working in and through people, while those same people are struggling with faith and life as they relate to Him.
While aimlessly checking out maps and pondering the history of the land in and around Israel, I came upon this:
“Ruth’s story can be viewed as a discussion of both God’s sovereignty and the consequences of disobedience. The opening chapters suggest that the family’s circumstances are due to both national and personal disobedience. Ruth’s story is set in a time “when everyone did what was right in his own eyes” (Judg 17:6; 21:25). Deuteronomy 12:8 stresses that rebellion against God will result in famine. When Naomi declares that she should be called Mara (מָרָא, mara’), meaning “bitterness,” instead of Naomi (נָעֳמִי, no’omiy), meaning “pleasant,” she expresses that her circumstances are the result of God’s hand of chastening (Ruth 1:20, 21). Elimelech’s name means “My God is king” (אֱלִימֶ֫לֶךְ, elimelekh). This is ironic considering his abandonment of his community and God, which culminated in his sons marrying foreign women. Additionally, Ruth’s story demonstrates the inclusion of Gentiles in God’s redemptive plan.” – Logos Bible Software/Factbook/Ruth/“Themes”
That Logos “factbook” entry[1] carries more than facts, but I would agree with most of the analysis, adding or clarifying some. Here is my expanded version of the above. Maybe it’s more of a sermonizing digression. . . .
Certain aspects of the Ruth narrative are remarkable, namely, faith in the middle of tragedy, and the way things can work out, whether we call it serendipity or God’s Plan or something else.
This story seems to be set in the relatively narrow time period of the Judges, which I view as critical viz. the degradation of the people’s reliance on God as their one Sovereign. This era immediately followed the period of Joshua’s leadership and the so-called “conquest of Canaan.” Relatively speaking, then, the Judges were active not long after the exodus from Egypt. Seen in that light, this time period by all rights should have been one of faith’s “summer,” as it were—a time of sunshine in the knowledge that Yahweh had brought them out of the tortures of slavery, had seen them through years of semi-faithless wandering, and had provided new lands for their habitation.
However, the people “did what was right in their own eyes” and not in the eyes of God. As a result of disobedience to the delivered revelation of God—the Decalogue and the rest of the Torah—famine ensued. This eventuality may be seen as the result of disregard of Yahweh’s provision. In other words, when Elimelech took his family out of Israel to a foreign land, he was, in one way of looking at it, ignoring God’s steadfast love over time, as well as God’s reign and rule.
Because the nation of Israel then constituted God’s special people, I would say it is right to assert that Naomi’s family’s “circumstances are due to both national and personal disobedience.” However (and this is a big however), that nation of Israel no longer exists, and the nation of the U.S.A. certainly isn’t chosen, so it is important to distinguish between “national disobedience” then and now. Further, there is no real leg to stand on when one wishes to draw a parallel between any divine “chastening” of a nation then and any apparently similar situation today. In other words, we can speculate till the cows come home that God is punishing the U.S., and it’s possible, but there would need to be a categorically different basis for the punishment.
God has discretion and absolute sovereignty, yet I see no reason to think that whatever was happening in the time of the ancient Judges would be analogous to America, or to any other nation, now. It’s not that America is any better or worse, morally speaking. (OK, it’s worse. But that’s not the issue.) It’s that America is not God’s chosen people, and He therefore would not treat our secular nation the same way the theocractic Israel was treated. An appeal to Deuteronomy 12:8 is probably well-placed in the analysis of the Ruth narrative, but it is not applicable to the sphere of 21st-century morals and geopolitics.
The names are obviously significant. Naomi (“Pleasant”) says she is bitter and wants to be called that. “Ruth” means something like “companion” or “friend,” and both of those meanings are clearly played out in the story. Ruth’s and her sister’s husbands’ names are representative, too. But what of the name Elimelech? It means “my God is King” or “my King is God.” How does this figure in? The Logos factbook asserts irony, and I do not disagree. Here is a man whose very name gives the proper place to Yahweh, and yet that man does not, in his decision-making process, appear to put Yahweh on that same high place. He abandons home in a state of fear and desperation, and he goes to live among foreigners. His sons marry foreign women who would not have been of the “chosen people.” When Elimelech dies, is that an indication that God is no longer King in this Israelite-turned-Moabite household? Or does it rather show that the life of the man who did not give the proper place to his God was cut off, so that the rest of the family, with more faith, could be sustained? Or is all this merely incidental, as so many of any life’s circumstances are?
When tragedy strikes, what do we do? That is the question. And we learn a great deal from the characters of the story of Ruth.
Naomi, although “bitter” and utterly affected, returns home. Ruth, the “companion,” goes with her mother-in-law to that same land—a land that was then foreign to her. What subsequently takes place is highly significant. She marries Boaz, a relative of her deceased father-in-law and deceased husband Mahlon. In seeming quasi-accord with Hebrew provision, the bloodline could then be carried on . . . but not without our recognition, in hindsight, that this is all so out of the norm! Ruth, after all, was not one of the “chosen.” But now she is! Boaz was not Mahlon’s brother; he was a more distant relative who wouldn’t really have figured in, according to what is written. But it all worked out!
So, things come full circle:
The family with young sons goes east to foreign Moab, ostensibly against God-as-King, and meeting tragedy.
Then the surviving faithful go back west to Israel, which is foreign to one of them, trying to be subject to God-as-King, and joy follows.
~ ~ ~
I wonder what happened to Chilion’s wife, Orpah. (Maybe if she had come down through history differently, young Orpah Winfrey’s relatives and friends would have known how to pronounce her given name, and she wouldn’t have changed the spelling to “Oprah”!) Although Orpah initially wanted to go with Naomi, her original, short-sighted advice took hold, and Orpah stayed in Moab. Perhaps she remarried there, and never thinking of Yahweh again. Or maybe she later traveled to visit her family in Bethlehem. No matter; she does not figure into the story again.
Ruth, however, becomes a hinge figure in history. She shows what can happen if one is faithful to God. I would even suggest that, for Ruth, God became King, in a sort of turn on her father-in-law’s name and actions. And this story shows, too, that it’s not just about the “chosen” in the human kingdom or nation. God has always cared for all people, not just the Israelites. And many generations down the road, Jesus Messiah, the “Light for the gentiles,” according to Simeon (Luke 1), was the living legacy of that truth.
[1] Footnote mine, not Logos’s. I take exception, on both linguistic and conceptual bases, to the capital letter on “Gentiles” near the end of this entry. The word “gentiles” should not, in my view, be a proper noun. Most often, the word simply refers to the others, i.e., people other than the people of Israel.
This past Sunday, we sang “To Christ Be Loyal and Be True.” I don’t think I’ve heard or sung that in a quarter-century, but it was a good “refresh” for me.
Certain militaristic imagery such as these lines are dated and not very helpful, such as these:
Yet is is good for believers to consider themselves “soldiers” in the King’s service. The refrain, with its promise of Jesus helping me with my “conflicts” if I am loyal to Him, seems a little cheap to me (as is a fourth stanza’s notion that Jesus will be my friend; this was wisely omitted from the hymnal my church used), but I suppose it will resonate with those in interpersonal conflict. The opening line was the main draw, and that was a good thing.
After reflection, I would present the third stanza as the standout. This is thoroughly worthy:
To Christ be loyal and be true;
In noble service prove
Your faith and your fidelity,
The fervor of your love.
My faithfulness to the Lord Christ is certainly something to be proven, to be worked out over time. Faithfulness, fidelity, and loyalty are synonyms. All the attendant ideas ought to be more in our consciousness and in the workings-out of our lives. This is about being a faithful disciple, a loyal subject of King Jesus.
I have a friend whose opinions and positions on important things are typically on target and sometimes formidable. A few years ago, this friend shared an idea that was troublesome to me. I don’t know whether he meant to be provoking thought in me, but I experienced a pragmatic (not necessarily theological) challenge to “king” and “kingdom” language, which is language I’ve spent a lot of time with.
Since then, I have considered numerous times the use of phrases such as “King Jesus” and “the Kingdom of God,” wondering if I might be doing a disservice to eternal truths by using such language in present contexts. This is no sideline matter. First, concerns around “who’s in charge” (i.e., who is “king”) tend to be integral in human affairs. Moreover, the Kingdom of God is a cardinal life-emphasis for me.¹
Conceptually, I see “kingdom” and “reign/rule” everywhere. Kingdom concerns seem to sit atop all others. I believe that the more often kingdom/kingship ideas are prioritized in human spheres, the more problems will be resolved, both now and forever. I happen to think that that generalization is appropriately broad and sweeping! I believe it is applicable to personal and interpersonal matters, church matters, and more. As long as there are nation-states, there will be a conflicts between illusory human sovereignty on the one hand and God’s kingship on the other. But matters of the world will eventually dissolve in acknowledgment of God as King.
Despite all that, any time there is a potential for language to get in the way of communicating what’s important, it is good to reexamine that language. The understanding of words, and language itself, are ever changing. If a phrase such as “Kingdom of God” does not communicate well, reconsideration is warranted, and revision might be advisable.
I have and appreciate my own copy of N.T. Wright’s Kingdom New Testament—which uses “King” where other English Bibles use “Christ.” I use this Bible sparingly when interacting with others, and when I do, I seem to want to apologize for its incessant “King Jesus.”² Thinking about that feeling further . . . I must ask myself why I haven’t apologized for the now-glossed-over the loanword “Christ” all these years. Do I really think about that word as much as we should? Maybe we should all be apologizing for not paying attention to the range of meanings behind the words Messiah and Christ! One meaning, for example, would be “anointed one” . . . and what does that really mean, unless we appeal to another time and place for historical context?
The introduction of the Mark-gospel doesn’t beat around the bush: “The beginning of the gospel of Jesus Christ, the Son of God.” But what is this gospel, this good news, and what is it to be “Christ”? Mark quotes from Isaiah, who promised the way would be prepared for the One who was to come. And in the first section after the introduction, Jesus’ authority is highlighted:
1:22 The people there were amazed by his teaching, because he taught them like one who had authority, not like the experts in the law. 1:23 Just then there was a man in their synagogue with an unclean spirit, and he cried out, 1:24 “Leave us alone, Jesus the Nazarene! Have you come to destroy us? I know who you are—the Holy One of God!” 1:25 But Jesus rebuked him: “Silence! Come out of him!” 1:26 After throwing him into convulsions, the unclean spirit cried out with a loud voice and came out of him. 1:27 They were all amazed so that they asked each other, “What is this? A new teaching with authority! He even commands the unclean spirits and they obey him.” 1:28 So the news about him spread quickly throughout all the region around Galilee. (bold emphases mine, of course -bc)
Could it also be that the theophany (in this case, the voice from heaven) of Mark 1:10-11 is intended to show a kind of bestowing of authority? And could that authority have something to do with the kingly identity of Jesus the Messiah?
The next episode shows four people almost inexplicably following Jesus, so that would be a natural result of the authority. Mark is notoriously short-winded overall, not indulging in lengthy explanations, but the reader/hearer of this opening gets a clear picture, right off the bat, that Jesus is unique, uniquely gifted, and uniquely tasked. He is the Son of God. He is also the One Who Was To Come, the Christ, and the Anointed King. And all those appellations would seem to involve authority.
And that is good news: that this One has come and is reigning: Jesus the Messiah. Jesus the King. Jesus the Reigning Authority.
¹ Here is my current life emphases, in no particular order:
² We would need to ask Wright why he chose “King” instead of “Christ” as a persistent rendering of χριστός | christos throughout all his New Testament. I suspect it has something to do with wanting readers to pay attention to the present, positional dominion of Jesus, who is now and forevermore the “Lord and King” (Philippians 1:9). It also could be related, in broader perspective, to concepts of “empire.” Whatever his reasons, at least it makes us think. Shaking up hackneyed language can do that.
From time to time, I cross-post from one blog to another. I do this primarily for my own purposes, keeping track of writings that involve the other blog’s interests. Most subscribers on this blog also subscribe to my other one, but those who simply click into this one might be interested in the other. The first piece below references church administration mattes that also touch, in my mind, on the Kingdom of God.
Here is a more extended (if not thorough) essay. On one level, this is about lies, honesty, and civil disobedience. On another, it’s about living with integrity as a God-person—and that proposition is quite distinct from living as an American, or an American conservative, or an American “conservative Christian.”
This next piece is longish, about “home. The direct relationships to the Kingdom of God are scant. Toward the end, I note that, although Christian songs of yore speak of Heaven as “home,” that nomenclature doesn’t appear in the scriptures, as far as I can recall. Whatever heaven is, I suppose it is a “home,” but that label seems far too earthly and insignificant. Perhaps the most important reference to my thinking on Kingdom(s) is at the end, where I mention being a traveling pilgrim, not “at home.”
And finally, here is a link to a short post on “church” and the building. Those two will be distinct in the mind of anyone who thinks seriously about church. The unhelpful connection of church and the building persists, unfortunately. I’d go so far as to call it a misleading, relentless pervasiveness. If God is not God outside the building, we are of all men to be pitied. And if I am not a subject of the King outside the walls of a church edifice, I am not really a subject of the King.
The U.S. southern border is a problem, and most people with open eyes have been aware of that for quite some time. I do not presume to address, and surely cannot solve, the whole problem in this essay. I do however herein assert the logical impropriety of the appeals to Jesus when discussing the U.S.’s border policies and practices viz. migrants.
The USA cannot be borderless, or it will cease to be a country. Furthermore, if a country’s borders are not clear, there is more likelihood of a multiplicity of concerns.¹
God’s kingdom, on the other hand, is conceptually borderless. (The physical aspect doesn’t enter the spiritual picture. This assertion is supported by numerous scriptural texts of both Hebrew and Christian collections.)
Digging into history a bit, I would make this statement: there has always been a non-mappable reality of the “area” of God’s eternal reign and rule; however, the present iteration of God’s kingdom must be in some respects distinguished from the kingdom(s) of Israel before Jesus. During the time of ancient Israel’s kings (which involved an inherently conflicted reality, in that God’s kingship was compromised), there was clearly a different sense of “kingdom.” Boundaries might not always have been clear, but they existed. Even during the Assyrian and Babylonian captivities, a sense of geographical homeland seems to have persisted. Yet beyond the land of Israel, God never ceased to be King.
Today, in contrast to pre-Jesus time, God’s kingdom “borders” are conceived of differently. There are now no physical borders that may really enter a conversation about God’s kingdom. It is spiritual/conceptual in nature. The border-vs.-no-border distinction is one consideration that ought to keep thoughtful Christians from devolving into Christian nationalism associated with a country.
N.B. There are two types of kingdoms (and never the twain shall fully meet, although they may be related at points). One is geopolitical, such as the modern state of Israel, whereas the constitution of other type is conceptual and spiritual. See here and here for some thoughts on the modern, bordered Israeli state vis-à-vis “the Jews.”
In reporting on the rather obvious border crisis, so-called liberal pundits have tended² to use the term “migrant,” and such commentators also downplay—at least, until recently—legalities, practicalities, and the country’s need to have and to secure its physical border. The beautiful “give me your tired, your poor” notion cannot be the U.S.A.’s mantra in a time such as the present: threats related to the (2) influx of drugs and (2) massive infiltration by enemy populations constitute real and present dangers to a geopolitically defined country. Moreover, the sheer numbers of illegal immigrants overwhelm everyone involved, sometimes causing inter-state feuding over methodologies and the provision of basic shelter for illegals already inside the country. Self-proclaimed “sanctuary cities” such as NYC are experiencing overload, leading even to intra-party fighting.
On the contrary, when conservative commentators opine on the border crisis, words like “alien” and “illegal” tend to be used more frequently, and the obvious failures of President Biden, his border chief, and other staff members³ are in evidence. If I didn’t know better, I’d think the influx is being orchestrated in order to give the Democratic party another win in 2024. I no longer care too much if I manifest increasingly “conservative” leanings on this question and others. Some things just make sense, and others don’t. Although I would never defend a country’s border myself, I can see clearly that a country needs a sense of sovereignty over its territory; to suppose otherwise is nonsense, whether it’s liberal or progressive or not.
So what does a Christian do, if anything? How should a Christian feel about (1) migrants and (2) the migrant crisis? (These items are distinct.)
In 2005, I went to UNC in Greeley, CO as a graduate student. The population of the city included many Hispanics, and I learned a few things about that subculture. I didn’t have much of a sense of the (comparatively minor) migrant/immigration issues then, although I did hear speculation that some of the Spanish-speaking Christians who met, mostly separately, in our church building could very well have been in the country illegally. My general sense then was that those Christians looked the other way, not getting into the business of who was legal and who wasn’t, because our calling was to the spiritual needs, not to be national “gatekeepers.” (These are my words in hindsight, not the words of anyone there at the time.) These days, I wonder how things are in Greeley. I could ask, because I still count three or four families there as friends. But I’m a little afraid to ask, because there is an inevitable conflict at the intersection of (1) U.S.A. laws and concerns and (2) living for God and being King Jesus’s emissary in this land. The practice of abetting illegal action cannot be upheld; however, for a Christ-oriented person faced with an human need, conflicted feelings can easily arise.
The conundrum can be relieved somewhat, though, by distinguishing between human government and God’s kingship in the life of an individual.
A political party will feel called upon to set a policy, to speak, to write, and to encourage constituents to act and feel in certain ways. A denomination or institutional church might do the same. (This similarity speaks volumes about the problem with institutional church!)
An individual, on the other hand, when dealing with another individual, should take cues from the Master. Feeding the hungry? Yes, if you (sg.) need some food, I will try to get it for you, or I’ll share some of mine. If you (sg.) need a ride, I’ll provide it. If you need a bed, I have a sort-of guest room. Imprisoned? It gets complicated there, because the detention centers and the asylum processing system are so vastly, incorrigibly overrun that it’s ridiculous. And all these needs of individuals quickly become overwhelming, massive plurals.
Now that I think about it, within the last week, I’ve had two opportunities to help other individuals. In one case, I found out that no help was really needed. In another case, I helped. If I lived in a southern border state, and if an illegal, undocumented, migrant alien knocked on my door and needed food, I would help, and I might even hide the person in my house until a legal, safe path forward could be found.
A country, though, cannot allow teeming masses of people to cross its borders unfettered. Nor can it refuse to act on policy enacted in the name of order and to keep such mass immigration from occurring. A country should not and cannot be held to Jesus’ standard (Matt. 25 and other texts). A country has borders and has the right to do large-scale things to ensure those borders are respected. An individual, or an individual family, in need of mercy and provision would get it from me, if I could provide it. In so doing, I would be acting as a member of the “royal priesthood, the holy nation” (1 Peter). But a nation-state is bound to no such ethic, and in reality, if it acts that way on a grand scale, it is compromising itself and ignoring its very nature.
¹ Of course, borders and border security are not the only concerns. Not by any stretch. To name a few others:
² Of late, it seems that even the most ardent supporters of the Biden administration are seeing the serious issues, as well as the lies at points. Still, their preconceptions and vantage points will affect their vocabulary choices.
³ President Biden’s press secretary, dubbed “Karine Jean-Identity-Hire” by brilliant humorist/author Andrew Klavan, seems to be either patently unintelligent or a pathological liar, based on certain statements and non-statements on this topic.
Postscript (because I really don’t want to save this material and write another full post on this):
John Bright’s book The Kingdom of God (Abingdon Press, 1953) takes a historical approach, walking the reader through centuries of God’s dealings with his people. It seems to me that such an approach will likely result in a more adequate kingdom-ology than any theology or philosophy, especially if the latter is detached from history and the scriptures. Observing historical events in terms of human failures and foibles, and of God’s expectations and responses seems to get at the root of what it means to be sovereign on the one hand, and submissive subjects on the other. Bright treats the actual work of the King among actual people. I am as likely to keep referring to his book as to any other on this subject, including my own.
Toward the end of a section, Bright offered the words below. Many sections are profound, but my eyes stopped and rested on p. 94 today.
Yes, heretofore, we have dealt with Israel as a nation. Israel is the covenant people of God, the chosen people of his election, the heirs of his promises. We have seen how easily this idea could be prostituted until, in popular imagination, the people of God became identified with the Israelite state, and the victory of God’s purpose with the glorification of that state. We have also seen that the prophets were obliged to reject that identification completely. Yet not completely, for they could never agree that Israel’s failure involved the failure of God. In the notion of the Remnant, however, a distinction begins to be drawn between physical Israel and the true Israel, the actual Israel and the ideal Israel. The notion begins to take root in Hebrew theology that actual Israel will not inherit the kingdom of God—that vision will ever be beyond her.
Speaking for myself, I would not assert that “the church” has “replaced” ancient Israel per se. Some might read “the church” as one of today’s institutions, or as the collection of all denominations. Replacement, stated that way, seems anachronistically over-stated and misleading. Neither will I be shy, though, about saying that it is the people of the new covenant to which all of theological history has pointed.
I have rarely if ever found a phrase in Bright’s book to be quibbled with, but I might not have chosen “actual Israel” in the sentence quoted above. It seems to me that, when one looks backward and all around the notion of God’s kingship, the ideal Israel should really be equated to actual Israel. The scenario could not always have been sized up in this way, though. God’s original covenants—e.g., Noahic, Abrahamic, Mosaic, and perhaps others could be added—were as true in their respective eras as the current covenant is in ours. Both Joshua’s Israel and David’s Israel were actual Israels at the time. Yet times change, and people change. God does not himself change, but his responses to people are changing, dynamic—and responsive, as responses are! The coming of the Christ was the ultimate instance of God’s response to humanity’s predicament.¹
I’m gladdened that a scholar such as John Bright has rejected the notion that the Israeli nation-state of 1948 comprised the people of God. Written less than a decade after the end of WWII, and just five years after the modern nation of Israel was born, that statement might have required some courage.
Christians’ place in the cosmos now is not a matter of “replacement,” really; that term casts a negative light on Israel that existed prior to the Incarnation. I don’t claim to understand all the ins and outs of replacement or remnant theology. I do however strongly suspect that the people of the new covenant fully constitute God’s people today.
¹ I would go so far as to say, logically speaking, that there could yet be another covenant put in place at some point in the future. Theologically and scripturally speaking, on the other hand, another covenant is as unimaginable to me as the possibility that Mormon founder Joseph Smith wasn’t delusional. I suppose Moses could not really have conceived of the New Covenant while he lived, either, but it’s impossible for me to conceive of any new covenant apart from Jesus Christ.
For today, I remind myself and a few readers of this, which is framed and hanging in my study:
– Gary D. Collier
Here is a related post from earlier this year:
“Author David French urges Christian voters to ‘act justly, love kindness, and walk humbly.'” – The Christian Chronicle, November 2023
I was not swiftly drawn in by that lead to find magnificently conceived philosophies and groundbreaking advice. Who hasn’t heard that Micah quotation before, and why use it as a subtitle for a supposedly provocative, insightful interview? Oh, well.
I was interested in what this person had authored. Try as I might, though, I could not find anywhere in the two-page interview/article the title of any book French had written. As an author myself, I wish I’d been interviewed; enviously speaking, I think I could have said equally insightful, and even more incisive things. (But that is not very nice of me, so I should delete that. [But that would be disingenuous of me, so I’ll leave it in.])
Before I get to the good stuff, I’ll register my objection that a former military man, a political columnist for the NY Times (a “former newspaper,” as Andrew Klavan says), and a figure compared to Ralph Reed of the Christian Coalition, is appealed to for any thoughts on the relationship of the Christian to human government. Those factors insert huge question marks into consideration of whatever Mr. French has to say. He does, however, have impressive credentials:
David French joined The New York Times as an Opinion columnist in January 2023. Before that, he was a senior editor at The Dispatch, which he helped start, and a contributing writer at The Atlantic.
He spent most of his career as a practicing lawyer, working in both commercial and constitutional litigation. In his late 30s, he joined the United States Army Reserve as a judge advocate general. He deployed to Iraq in 2007 and served in Diyala Province, where he was awarded a Bronze Star. During his legal career, he litigated in federal courts from coast to coast and served as a lecturer at Cornell Law School. He is a former president of the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression. – NY Times
French has said some worthy things in the Chronicle’s interview, but I don’t know that many of them are all that quotable. I found that the title of his most recent book is Divided We Fall: America’s Secession Threat and How to Restore Our Nation. I am immediately disinterested in the book, because the title’s focus is nationalistic although the book is written by a professing Christian. Had I first known him as someone who wrote about biblical texts or God or worship or discipleship or even theological history, perhaps I’d be more interested in his ideas on American restoration. I also acknowledge an over-sensitivity to the presupposition that political and military experience qualifies one to comment on the intersection of Christianity and civil government. Indeed: such experience might just be the scale-tipping factor that keeps one from having anything worthwhile to say in this area. Not that someone with military experience has no insight; far from it. But we tend to presume that being military or retired military equals having a soapbox labeled “Respectable Man.” Despite the apparent presumption that makes my hair stand on end, I read on. . . .
French compares his wartime experience with Sunni/Shia disputes to today’s Republican/Democrat climate. That sounds on target to me. I’m even more interested, however, in his mention of the “upside-down kingdom of God.” That is one apt characterization of God’s rule and reign, in my estimation. French rightly points out that Jesus wasn’t about overthrowing Rome. “That does not mean we should allow injustice. But what it does show is that there is a different kind of call on the people of God.” Yes, I agree (no matter how we conceive of “calling”). I find the subsequent appeal to Micah 6:8 hackneyed, and the suggestion that Paul’s admonition to Timothy about the “spirit of power” has something to do with not attributing power to Biden or Harris or Clinton is barely dubious.
The next topic reveals an insight: that someone born and raised in a “small denomination” (i.e., smaller than mainline denominations, I presume) will likely not grow up with the presumption that “we” have the “power” to “run things.” Roman Catholics and Presbyterians and even Baptists, for instance, might tend to think they can affect national politics by coercion, although they probably wouldn’t call it that. French appears to affirm that power should not provide the primary impetus for Christian living and action. He also seems to translate this (rightly) negative view of power into a focus on justice. That doesn’t seem to be a bad thing, but in today’s lingo, “justice” may well be read as “social justice,” which again has associations that are neither pure nor precise. Painting with a broad brush, I would agree with French that justice is to be upheld over power (or the pursuit of power), but the devil is in the details.
Finally, the interviewer gets to that age-old, annoying question: what about Christians and voting? And again, French points to justice, with a wispy suggestion that one doesn’t have to vote in every election if his polar star is justice. Unfortunately, he doesn’t take the bait of the interviewer’s appeal to David Lipscomb. He passes right by Lipscomb’s philosophy, despite the fact that he has recently been named a Distinguished Visiting Professor of Public Policy at David Lipscomb University. Perhaps some connective thoughts were edited out of the interview: he does suggest that actual Christian living (time, energy, effort, community) is what it’s all about, whereas the vote is not. I would add that the vote is not only the exercise of the “voice,” as we have long been taught in our democratic republic; it is also an indication that we want, and believe we have, political power.
Foreword: My first post on the tragic Israel situation (and this one should probably be the last) was more than two weeks ago. Coincidentally, that post referred to another article by the same author referred to below.
I skimmed an article by former diplomat and historian Michael Oren, an Israeli-American, about the violence in Israel and Gaza. The subtitle and some of the later content surprised me, and a few lines even disturbed me. The article’s publisher, The Free Press, has a vested interest in that its founder and her spouse are Jewish; although they are wholly justified in spotlighting this situation with its global implications, the possibility of bias exists, even with these particular journalists.
As if the world could do with any more negative stimuli, the pro-Israel and pro-Hamas rhetoric are both hot already. It seems historically on track to note that most Christians, most Republicans, and a good number of moderate Democrats have taken a pro-Israel stance, while those in many prestigious universities and large cities these days are reportedly leaning heavily toward the Palestinian side. I find this whole ball of wax quite complicated in terms of nationalism/ethnology/culture,¹ and I would at least suggest to today’s Israelis that God once directed the Hebrews to “colonize” the “promised land,” driving out others who had been living there. Then, at some point, others took over this or that part of the land, and Muslims were part of subsequent “colonizations.” The word “colonize” is apparently a lightning rod, but I think it is fair to apply it to both sides.
Do Israelis today have a right to the land because God gave it to them? I don’t know whether many of them would have appealed, even subconsciously, to Moses and Joshua after the most recent attack. The developing theocracy of that time notwithstanding, it is incumbent on Israelis to realize that those Hebrews they call ancestors were once themselves the marauders who overtook the land. History involves one horrible war after another; I don’t know why one set of wars is more determinative than another. All wars I can call to mind have people embroiled in horrific struggles for sovereignty; this observation holds true in Ukraine, Israel, and much more. I suspect that Jews must sense a kind of historical-theological imperative beyond what might be termed “international law” in this century, and, from a secular point of view—and make no mistake that war is secular—international law and the understood rules of war trump any history and theology, whether real or imagined.
I’ll paste in a few quotations from Oren’s article, with comment. Here is the lead:
“Hatred of Israel cannot be distinguished from hatred of the Jewish people. Incontestably now, anti-Zionism is antisemitism.”
Oren and I would presumably both presuppose that Palestinians and most other Muslims do hate the nation-state of Israel as a geopolitical entity. Yet hating a nation-state simply isn’t the same thing as hating the people who live there. I’m not sure how one ascertains that someone hates a country as such. Yes, there is a kind of sinister metonymy that can occur, in that if one says often enough that he hates Israel, he could come to substitute unconsciously the word “Israel” for the people. Still, if the phrase “the Jewish people” means the same thing to the author as “the nation of Israel,” well, it shouldn’t. (I hate many things that are going on in my own country, and some days, if pressed enough, I might even carelessly say I hate the whole thing, but that does not by any stretch mean that I hate the people.)
I also offer a demurrer to the second assertion above. “Anti-Zionism is antisemitism,” wrote Dr. Oren. I think “anti-Zionism” can imply different things, or at least entail different scopes. However one defines anti-Zionism,² that term does not necessarily require that the person who holds that view also be against the Jewish people.
“Antisemitism” is broadly understood as anything that opposes Jewish people, although technically it would include other descendants of Shem—for instance, some Arabs, Ethiopians, and others. Differing understandings and opinions may coexist, yet it’s difficult for them to do so when people groups and war are involved. I remain convinced that a proper view of God’s reign does not assign significant roles to the world’s potentates or to land holdings, and that is the overarching raison d’etre for this Subjects of the Kingdom blog. Contra the import of the antisemitism-related subtitle quoted above, I believe that the distinguishing of geopolitics, theology, and faith in God itself remains important. Taking a position against—or for—a nation does not necessitate a set of relational or theological implications.
These notions, then, are rejectable: (1) being against a nation equals hating people, and (2) not supporting “Zionism” equals being anti-Jewish.
For many centuries, the term “innocent Jew” was an oxymoron. Jews were guilty by birth, by belief, and by ancestry. There is a religious tenet of Judaism, reenacted each year at Passover, that all Jews were present at the exodus from Egypt and when God gave the laws to Moses at Sinai. Twisting this is a Christian belief that all Jews were present at, and responsible for, the crucifixion. More than Pilate, more than Judas—a name not chosen randomly—the Jews were damned for deicide.
But killing God is only one of the sins for which Israelis—read: Jews—are being demonized in this war. Behind the reports of the deliberate Israeli bombing of Palestinian neighborhoods—reports that meticulously stress the number of children killed—lies the 144,000 children mythically massacred by the Judean King Herod.
– Excerpts from “Michael Oren: A War Against the Jews,” The Free Press, 10/26/23
I’m ignorant about many things, and apparently the use of the phrase “innocent Jew” is one of them. I don’t remember ever having heard that term; I therefore have no association with it at all. “Giant shrimp” and “old news” are oxymoronic, but “innocent Jew” can only be an oxymoron if it’s recognizable, and I don’t think it is. I don’t know where this author has been digging or hiding; in the mind of this Caucasian Christian, Jews are not innately guilty of anything because of their ethnicity.
The idea (first paragraph, third sentence) that Christians believe all Jews were present and responsible at Jesus’ crucifixion is laughable. I mean, I suppose it’s possible that some 19th- or 20th-century Germans were so historically ignorant that they could have thought that was possible, and again, I myself am ignorant of many things. I can only say authoritatively that I myself have never heard such an idea until this very point in my life. Therefore, because this thought is utterly new to me, and I am neither illiterate nor an ostrich, I think find it almost ludicrously offensive to suggest that it is “a Christian belief.”
Next: the author asserts that “Jews were damned for deicide,” i.e., killing God. Although I am currently persuaded that anyone who expressly and intentionally rejects Jesus and never turns from that stance will be eternally apart from God, that is different from saying that “the Jews were damned.” Speaking only for myself (and not for Eusebius or Augustine or Hildegard or Luther or Calvin or any other historical theologian), I’d offer this: I don’t believe King David was damned for murder, so why would I, as a Christian, believe a Jew of the first century would be damned for contributing, in some indirect sense, to the crucifixion of the God-man Jesus? That act would have been wrong, and guilt would be part of the equation, but repentance would have been possible, so ultimate condemnation based on the crucifixion scenario is out of the picture. Recall with me, too, that Saul gave assent to the murder of Stephen (and the story of Stephen in Acts 7 bears certain resemblances to Luke’s account of Jesus’ crucifixion), yet Saul was not damned.
Why did Oren introduce King Herod in the second paragraph above? I’ve not heard the 144,000 number in this context before, either. The use of term “mythical” with reference to the killing of children (noted in Matthew 2) elicits a defensive response in Jesus-believers; that word, too, weakens Oren’s article, and I feel no need to go further.
The Free Press may certainly give due attention to the awful and gruesome things going on in Israel and Gaza, but all journalists should take care. Palestinians have done horrific things, and so have Israelis. The Israel-state is not above criticism, and the notion that it has a place whereas Arabs do not is a rejectable one.
It does no good to say so, but I still condemn all war and all violence . . . all the while recognizing that, as long as this world-system exists, there will be wars.
¹ I doubt that even the Samaritans of Jesus’ day were a monolith. Is it any wonder that the Jew/Israel/Arab situation is impossible to resolve? Intermarrying does occur. Both Arabs and Jews live in many countries, and the lineage is messy, to say the least.
Jump out of the Middle East for a moment to ponder the proposition of tracking an African line of descent backward from 1920s North Carolina. One might come to know, with some certainty, the names of the mothers for three or four generations back, but the identity of the fathers is probably a different story. Alex Haley’s compelling Roots investigations aside, could most black Americans today even begin to know which African region their great-great-great-great-great-great grandfathers lived in, prior to being shipped in chains to our continent? Even one side of my mostly literate, European ancestry has only been traced back to the early 1600s, and that with some doubt. Does a Gaza-dwelling Arab know for certain that he has no Jewish blood? Does a kibbutz-dwelling Jew know she has no Muslim blood from the Middle Ages?
² https://subjectsofthekingdomblog.wordpress.com/2017/04/27/on-israel-my-present-stance/
Dr. Brian Casey 