From: "Wm. Taylor" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
JT > By the second
century the early church was off into heresy
BT: You've said this on numerous
occasions, Judy: I am wondering, what was that heresy?
jt: Heresy either adds to or
takes from the Word of Truth and it grows as time goes on. The apostles
built upon the foundation of Christ the cornerstone and the Church are to be
living stones - a nation of kings and priests. However, by the 2nd Century
the elders were being called priests following which there were prayers for the
dead, veneration of angels, dead saints, and the use of images and on and on to
where the Church founded by the apostles is unrecognizable
today.
JT > and when Constantine
tried to blend church with state it made things much worse.
BT: On the one hand, Constantine
is to be thanked for putting an end to Roman sanctioned persecution of
Christians; on the other hand, he opened the door to no end of violent
crimes on the part of Christians against humanity -- whether it be in wars
against their Christian brothers or against worldly opposition. And so, I agree
with you -- in part. Nevertheless, I am surprised he is not your hero. Were it
not for him, your doctrine may have still been consistent with the early NT
church.
jt: I don't agree that Constantine
should be thanked for anything. The fires of persecution are what purifies the
Church. Constantine started a bastardized hybrid that is full of mixture and
that calls itself the church.
JT > Paul exhorts his hearers
to obey those who have been given Governmental authority
Yes, you are right: he did. Please allow me to set
a couple questions. The early church was under persecution, sometimes quite
intense, throughout the Second and Third centuries. These Christians lived in
Rome or Roman provinces. They were under Roman rule -- a rule which was truly
tyrannical. Nevertheless, they did not consider it a Christian alternative to
take up arms and fight for the right to govern themselves as they saw fit. In
other words they did not seek to declare their independence from Rome and
establish a separate nation of their own. Theirs was not a call to take up
weapons: they were to take up their crosses daily.
jt: For the Church headquarters
is in heaven. Jesus did not come to start another earthly kingdom.
However, the people of God are to resist evil which is not exactly 'peace at any
price'
BT: On the other hand, this is precisely the opposite of what our American forefathers found in the counsel they were receiving. They lived in English colonies, as English citizens, under English rule. Rather than live peaceably under the prescribed laws of their governing authorites, they cried tyrany, rebelled, declared their independence, took up arms, and in a bloodly war fought their way to nation status. All of this they did in and under the name of Christ.
jt: If I understand American history correctly the
people who left Holland on the Mayflower came to these shores to escape
religious oppression in England because they were being forced to be part of a
system they considered corrupt. I don't believe God expects his people to
be led about by a corrupt system any more than he expects a wife to be
in submission to a corrupt husband.
My question is this: If, as you rightly observe, Paul exhorts Christians to obey those who have been given Governmental authority, why was it a "Christian" thing to do for our founders to disobey those who had been given Governmental authority over them? (I would very much like an answer to this question -- and not only from you, but from Izzy also).
My question is this: If, as you rightly observe, Paul exhorts Christians to obey those who have been given Governmental authority, why was it a "Christian" thing to do for our founders to disobey those who had been given Governmental authority over them? (I would very much like an answer to this question -- and not only from you, but from Izzy also).
jt: God makes a way of escape when there is unbearable
oppression and apparently the Colonists believed this was so in 1781 - their cry
was against taxation without representation. Do you believe they should
have "put up and shut up?" What about abused wives? Should they do
the same?
If it was so clearly upon Christian principles that
our nation was founded (a claim that Izzy and others here on TT are so fond of
making), why did the Christians of less than one hundred years after the closing
of the NT Canon not find those same "principles" inscriptuarated in their
study? Why didn't those "principal" jump out to them as a strong point of
consideration? Why did those principles not drive them to the same conclusions
as our founding fathers? Why did they not fight
to establish a country of their own, one wherein they could vote (to answer
Izzy's indescretion) to uphold the supposedly Christian "rights" to life,
liberty, and the pursuit of happiness?
jt: The NT Canon was closed in 367AD
at which time the professing Church was hopelessly mired in mixture. Who
knows what they might have been thinking since Church and State were one
and the same by this time and the daily celebration called mass was adopted
shortly afterwards followed by the exaltation of Mary and the first use of the
term "Mother of God" by the Council of Ephesus in 431AD..
JT > and it appears (at
least once) that [Paul] valued and used his Roman citizenship to get himself out
of trouble.
BT: Yes, he did. And he did it in
a non-violent way -- a difference which, in light of this discussion, I am
noting.
jt: Then allow me to note
the times that Paul stirred up active aggression. I recall the incident in the
book of Acts when he cast the spirit of divination out of a girl who was
following them and upset her handlers; and another incident in Ephesus
when Alexander the coppersmith became unglued when Paul spoke against the great
goddess Diana which started a riot. Paul lived in a whole other reality which
was not of the "peace at any price" variety.
JT > Passivism early on led to monks, religious orders, quietism, pietism etc.
BT: It was not early "passivism" which led to these
things, Judy. These were all non-violent, post-Constantinian reactions to
Constantinian "Christian" madness.
jt: I believe many of them come from the mixture. There
is that kind of a mindset in Hinduism, Buddhism, and Mohandas Ghandi who is
revered by many (even though he was a most selfish man to his wife and
children) was Jainist. God has always had a
people though they were usually not the majority and there were groups that made
it through what you call the "Constantinian madness" who did not flee to a
Monastery.
JT > Do you see the "image of Christ" in any of them Bill?
BT: Yes, to some extent, I do; however, not completely.
These witnesses -- characteristically appealing primarily to the NT and the
example of Jesus -- have spoken out firmly against all war and killing and have
declared such practices incompatible with following Jesus. In this they are to
be admired and do reflect the "image of Christ." Nevertheless, as
movements they all moved away from Christ and into insignificance the more they
removed themselves from participation in the world. Never as Christians are we
called to enact a fortress mentality.
jt: Well their Jesus is not the Jesus of the Bible
because ultimately He is a man of war and he has always been against evil and on
the side of good. What about His cleansing of the temple and the way he
addressed the religious leaders at times?
BT: Allow me to state the obvious: history teaches that violence simply begets
violence. The long history of Christian "just wars" has wrought
suffering past all telling. Might it be that reason and sad experience could
disabuse us (read Christians) of the hope that we can approximate God's justice
through killing? Reason must be healed and taught by Scripture, and our
experience must be transformed by the renewing of our minds in
conformity with the mind of Christ. Only thus can Christians overcome their Constantinian warring
madness.
jt: I don't know that it's history teaching this lesson
Bill, it is the mantra of "pacifistic non-violence groups" today.
Unfortunately violence at times is what it takes to beget victory
over oppressive dictatorships. Someone fought
for the liberty these groups use in openly expressing their
philosophies.
BT: And let me clearly state that the reasons for choosing Jusus' way of
peacemaking are not prudential. In calculable terms, his way is sheer folly.
Still, why must we choose the way of non-violent love of enemies? If our
reasons for that choice are shaped by the NT, we are motivated not by the
sheer horror of war, not by the desire for saving our own skins and the
skins of our children, not by some general feeling of reverence for human
life, not by a naive notion that all people are basically nice and will be
friendly if we are friendly first. No, if our reasons for choosing non-violence
are shaped by the NT witness, we will act in simple obedience to the God
who willed that his own Son should give himself up to death on a cross. And we
will make this choice in the hope and anticipation that God's love will
finally prevail through the way of the cross, despite our inability to see how
this is possible.
jt: I don't see what you are describing in the New
Testament Bill. Jesus stayed in danger of losing his physical life the
whole time he ministered in Israel; the Jews were constantly plotting to kill
him and once tried to throw him off a cliff. After the cross the apostles
endured more of the same. What you describe is more like Mohandas Ghandi who
neglected his responsibility toward wife and family and just sat around looking
holy.
BT: That is the life of discipleship to which the NT
repeatedly calls us. This is the embodied life of early Christianity. When
the church as a community is faithful to that calling, it prefigures the
peaceable kingdom of God in a world wracked by violence (as testified to in the
witness of those Second century Christians).
jt: Let's fact it Bill. None of us were around
those second century "christians" and we don't know how much real peace they
walked in even though some of them may have talked what sounds like a good
game. Peace is not outward passivity only. Peace and rest come
by obedience to God's Word. He didn't let the generation who died in the
wilderness enter his rest though their generation were not involved with
violence... and the Church does not walk in the "peace that passes all
understanding" though we talk about it a lot. Our diseases testify against
us.
BT: This is the peace that passes understanding. It is the
peace that prompts the world to pronounce something divine in our midst. "This
does not seem to be the work of man," Mathetes wrote; "this is the power of
God," manifested in a uniquely peculiar form of life. Only when the church
renounces the way of violence will people see what the Gospel means, because
then they will see the way of Jesus reenacted in the church.
jt: No, it's only when the Church becomes
righteous and is conformed to the "image of Christ" which has nothing to do with
the "peace" movement per se because there will be wars and rumors of wars until
Jesus returns. The promise we do have is that when we please the Lord He
will cause even our enemies be at peace with us.
Judyt
