Lenten Reflection: St Paul and the Sign of Contradiction

The Apostle Paul is a model for us today because he reminds us that all Christians are a “Sign that is Spoken Against” in their love for truth and for God. To make my point I will briefly discuss several ideas. I’ll start with the nature of truth … comparing the Scripture’s view of truth and our public culture’s view of truth. Then I’ll move to what it means to be a sign of contradiction. I will finish by considering St. Paul’s love for truth and for God and the way he directs our attention to the Lord Jesus Himself.

1. What is Truth
The Lord Jesus said that He was Truth… He said “I am the Way the Truth and the Life.” Truth is a characteristic – and a communicable attribute – of the God of the Bible. The Hebrew word for truth (emeth) means … faithfulness. There is a one to one correspondence between what God says He will do and what he does…. He is truthful in what He says … He is faithful to do what He says he will do. …. There is a one to one correspondence between what God is … and what He perceives … He is omniscient or all knowing … and He knows all with certainty. Human beings can know the physical world truly to some extent…. Those who are the adopted children of God through Christ can also know spiritual realities truly.

Historically the Western world defined truth as “… the correspondence between the mind and reality.” What this means is that when the picture in your mind … matches what actually is … when it matches reality… you truly know; you have to some extent arrived at truth. This was the view of Plato and Aristotle.3 It has been the view of the Western world and it is also the view of the Bible.

The western cultural idea of truth has been changing though since Des Cartes in the 1600’s. Fredrick Nietzsche was a philosophy professor who lived in Germany from 1844 – 1900 and is probably the father of modern Atheism. He hated the apostle Paul. St. Paul had taken God’s truth in Christ – the gospel of salvation - and turned the pagan Roman world on its head. The world into which the gospel came was a world in which the powerful rose by crushing the weak underneath. For Nietzsche the only truth that exists is what he called the will to power. The title of the authorized biography of the Noble Prize winning Indian novelist V.S. Naipul is, The World Is What It Is. This title captures the current western idea that intellectual and moral truth cannot be known… or more precisely don’t exist… The very idea of a truth that can be known is a part of the imagination of the past. In a godless universe the only truth … is that the powerful rise, take charge and make the rules.

In American and Western public culture today – that is the culture of the media and university intellectuals – we hear of “narratives of truth.” Our culture tells us that there are as many narratives of truth or stories about what is true, as there are individuals. No story can have any more truth value than another. Douglas Farrow writes of the public culture in Canada

“… we have broken with the past… we have committed ourselves to the obvious absurdity of claiming that pluralism is our only norm, multi-culturism our only cultural foundation, diversity our only basis of unity and tolerance our highest virtue….
Tolerance is the highest virtue. That goes a long way to account for the spectacular intolerance … Canadian culture offers the world”.

Farrow points to several current cases being considered and tried by Canada’s state Human Rights Commissions (HCRs). These HRCs were set up to combat discrimination - or what is now called hate speech - on a practical level. He tells us that,

"The journal “Catholic Insight” is under investigation for reproducing in its pages biblical and magisterial teaching about homosexuality. The Protestant charity Christian Horizons has just been fined, and its leadership ordered to undergo reeducation for the crime of having a Christian code of conduct to which its employees must adhere. The Christian Heritage Party reports that three complaints have been filed against it “alleging ‘hatred’ and ‘contempt’ in the party’s twenty year old policy of opposing special rights for homosexuals”

Of course the Christian view of what is true has never changed. It is the same view of truth held by Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. It is the belief that God Himself is Truth… Yahweh or Jehovah, Adonai, is truth. The God and Father of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ … is the God of heaven and earth. God is in His Person… truth. God made human nature in His own image in a way that enabled men and women to know in part … but to know truly.

2. A Sign that is Spoken Against … A Sign of Contradiction

The world has always fought against the self revelation of God and His truth. In Luke 2 we read that Simeon prophesied to Mary and Joseph at the Presentation of the child Jesus in the temple that Jesus would Himself be a sign that was spoken against.

"... and Simeon blessed them and said to Mary his mother, "Behold, this child is set for the fall and rising of many in Israel, and for a sign that is spoken against (and a sword will pierce through your own soul also), that thoughts out of many hearts may be revealed." Luke 2.34-35 (Douay Rheims Bible translates the phrase as "sign that will be contradicted.")

Jesus came to bring salvation to all men, yet he is a sign of contradiction because some people will obstinately reject him -- for this reason he will be their ruin. But for those who accept him with faith … Jesus will be their salvation, freeing them from the power of sin in this life and raising them up to eternal life.

Simeon tells Mary that a sword will pierce through her own soul as well. The sword indicates that Mary will have a share in her son's sufferings. The last part of the prophecy tell us that uprightness or perversity will be demonstrated by whether one accepts or rejects Christ. Three elements are involved in a sign of contradiction. First an attack on Christ or people united with Christ through faith. This is followed by a double-movement which includes the downfall of those who reject Christ and the rise of those who accept him. This double-movement may be seen in the division Jesus referred to in one of the descriptions he gave of his mission on earth.

"Do you think that I have come to give peace on earth? No, I tell you, but rather division; for henceforth in one house there will be five divided, three against two and two against three; they will be divided, father against son and son against father, mother against daughter and daughter against her mother, mother-in-law against her daughter-in-law and daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law." (Luke 12:51-53)

Put very simply: some follow Him and some do not. The Scriptures tell us there are consequences of an everlasting nature that flow from both decisions.

In Acts 28 Luke suggested that all Christians were to be a sign spoken against. In the scene Luke paints the apostle Paul has just arrived in Rome and has called together the Jewish elders of that city.

“… and when they had gathered, [Paul] said to them, "Brethren, though I had done nothing against the people or the customs of our fathers, yet I was delivered prisoner from Jerusalem into the hands of the Romans. [18] When they had examined me, they wished to set me at liberty, because there was no reason for the death penalty in my case. [19] But when the Jews objected, I was compelled to appeal to Caesar -- though I had no charge to bring against my nation. [20] For this reason therefore I have asked to see you and speak with you, since it is because of the hope of Israel that I am bound with this chain." [21] And they said to him, "We have received no letters from Judea about you, and none of the brethren coming here has reported or spoken any evil about you. [22] But we desire to hear from you what your views are; for with regard to this sect we know that everywhere it is spoken against." Acts 28.17 – 22

Toward the end of his life the apostle Paul writes to Timothy and tells him that, “Indeed all who desire to live a godly life in Christ Jesus will be persecuted…” that is they will be a sign of contradiction. 2Tim3. 12

Why is this? A reading from Wisdom (Apocrypha) Chapter 2 gives us some explanation for the sign of contradiction.

[2] "For [some] reasoned unsoundly, saying to themselves, "Short and sorrowful is our life…. [12] "Let us lie in wait for the righteous man, because he is inconvenient to us and opposes our actions; he reproaches us for sins against the law, and accuses us of sins against our training. [13] He professes to have knowledge of God, and calls himself a child of the Lord. [14] He became to us a reproof of our thoughts; [15] the very sight of him is a burden to us, because his manner of life is unlike that of others, and his ways are strange. [16] We are considered by him as something base, and he avoids our ways as unclean; he calls the last end of the righteous happy, and boasts that God is his father. [17] Let us see if his words are true, and let us test what will happen at the end of his life; [18] for if the righteous man is God's son, he will help him, and will deliver him from the hand of his adversaries. [19] Let us test him with insult and torture, that we may find out how gentle he is, and make trial of his forbearance. [20] Let us condemn him to a shameful death, for, according to what he says, he will be protected." [21] Thus they reasoned, but they were led astray, for their wickedness blinded them, [22] and they did not know the secret purposes of God, nor hope for the wages of holiness, nor discern the prize for blameless souls; (Wisdom 2)

This reading foreshadows the events of next Friday – Good Friday - which we will commemorate in the suffering death and resurrection of the Lord Jesus. It also foreshadows in some degree the reaction of the world to every Christian believer.

Do we still see signs of contradiction today? Yes we do. In 1969 Pope Paul VI published the encyclical Humanae Vitae. Shortly after Pope Paul’s encyclical an essay on the encyclical was published by Dietrich von Hildebrand, a layman and theologian, entitled A Sign of Contradiction. This essay is a beautifully written explication and endorsement of the encyclical. In 1976 Karol Cardinal Wojtila preached the Lenten retreat to the household of Paul VI. It was also entitled A Sign of Contradiction. The encyclical’s teaching on contraception and particularly on the recently developed birth control pill had caused a firestorm of protest - much of it from Roman Catholics. This protest has never ceased.

Fr. Edward Oakes, a Jesuit who teaches at Mundelein Seminary describes some of the breadth and depth of the opposition Pope Paul VI faced from Catholics. The Pope had convened a papal commission to decide whether the new birth control pill should be defined as artificial birth control and thus forbidden. Pius XI’s encyclical of 1910 had already condemned artificial birth control. However when the papal commission finished its work a large majority of the commission voted not only for the pill but also implicitly for all other artificial birth control. This was in spite of the fact that all artificial means of birth control had already been condemned by Pius XI, Pius XII and by the Vatican II document Gaudeum et Spes. The papal commission had decided on its own that sexual expression and procreation should be de-coupled. Inspite of the papal commission’s report Pope Paul published Humanae Vitae.

De coupling sexual activity and procreation suggests that all forms of sexual expression and experience are normal, an understanding we live with in our public culture today. As an indication of how great the opposition to Pope Paul was at that time a subsequent Report on Human Sexuality commissioned by the Catholic Theological Society of America was published. It could not even bring itself to condemn any form of human sexual expression including bestiality.

On March 17th – just two weeks ago – a headline in the Wall Street Journal read: “Pope rejects condoms for AIDS Crisis”. The byline for the article was “Aboard the Papal plane.” The article is about the Pope’s trip to Africa. Even though a powerful case could and has been made for the vindication of Humanae Vitae - based on plummeting sexual morality in the western world over the last 50 years - … the Pope and the Roman Catholic church continue to be “a sign of contradiction” to the secular world and even to many within the church itself.

A favorite of teacher of mine, J. Vernon McGee, had a sermon he preached entitled “The Gospel Plow.” In his sermon he describes the sign of contradiction by saying that the gospel of God’s salvation in Christ goes through the earth like an old plow. … it throws up dirt on one side of the plow and on the other. Some are drawn in love to God though Christ. And others are repelled by Christ and the Gospel. Those who are drawn to Christ and to the light are a sign of contradiction to those who are not.

The Apostle Paul was among those drawn to the light. He was a sign of contradiction in his own time and he continues to be a sign of contradiction in our day. St. Paul put it this way:

“… thanks be to God, who in Christ always leads us in triumph, and through us spreads the fragrance of the knowledge of him everywhere. For we are the aroma of Christ to God among those who are being saved and among those who are perishing, to one a fragrance from death to death, to the other a fragrance from life to life. Who is sufficient for these things? (2 Cor 14 – 16)

3. Paul’s love for Truth

Who was Paul?
Paul was a single Jewish man probably in his 40’s when Jesus was crucified. Though Jewish he was born a Roman citizen so one or more of his parents had to have been Roman citizens. He was born in modern day Turkey in Tarsus which was a large commercial center. He studied in Jerusalem under Gamaliel, one of the leading scholars of the time, a man who was also a member of the ruling elders – the Sanhedrin – that had condemned Jesus to death. Paul was someone who probably had social position and status and who had the best graduate education available in Jewish life and the Hebrew Scriptures. Comparing him to the other apostles and to the other authors of the New Testament Paul is the most highly trained theologian. In addition to status, position and education Paul was an extremely hard working and zealous man. He says about himself,

[4] If any other man thinks he has reason for confidence in the flesh, I have more: [5] circumcised on the eighth day, of the people of Israel, of the tribe of Benjamin, a Hebrew born of Hebrews; as to the law a Pharisee, [6] as to zeal a persecutor of the church, as to righteousness under the law blameless. Phil 3

The risen Lord Jesus miraculously and spectacularly appeared to Paul to turn him around. After a short time in Damascus Paul spent a number of years in Arabia during which he began to re-understand the Old Testament in light of the coming of the Messiah, Jesus.

Over the course of his life God would inspire Paul to write 25% of the New Testament. Paul’s writings are in the form of letters he wrote to the new churches he had founded as a missionary. These letters were written for practical purposes but at the same time they reflect the deep levels of understanding that God had inspired in Paul of the truth. We do not find a neat systematic theology in Paul’s letters because that is not what God inspired Paul to write. Instead we find practical letters written to the churches he had founded through which he wove the understanding that God had given him of theological truth.

Paul is important for us today because he loved the truth.
Paul’s brilliant mind worked all his life to put together the one truth of God that runs from Old Testament through to the end of the New Testament. His love for the truth is characterized by a penetrating understanding of what God had done … was doing … and would do … in the world in and through Christ. This was an understanding that God Himself had inspired in Paul. He reminds us that his understanding of the gospel did not come by conversations with the other apostles but by direct revelation from the Lord Jesus Himself. His love for the truth is also characterized by the practical application of that theological truth to the living of life. For example in Romans we learn about the nature and the process of God’s salvation: that it is by grace through faith. We also learn about the relationship between the nation Israel… the people of the promise … and the Gentiles who participate in the promise originally made to the Jews. We learn about the judgment of God and the second coming of Christ in Thessalonians. In 1 Cor and Ephesians we learn about sexuality, marriage and divorce (1 Cor 7; 2Cor 6), the nature of the family and the roles of men and women; husbands, wives and children (Eph Col 1Cor). In Romans we learn about our relationship with government and the state (Rom 13.1-7); about the gifts in the Body of Christ, about the nature of the church (Rom 12.4; 1Cor 7.7, 12.12-14, 14; Eph 4) and about how to handle money (2 Cor9).

Did Paul encounter opposition in his own time? He tells us:

24] Five times I have received at the hands of the Jews the forty lashes less one. [25] Three times I have been beaten with rods; once I was stoned. Three times I have been shipwrecked; a night and a day I have been adrift at sea; [26] on frequent journeys, in danger from rivers, danger from robbers, danger from my own people, danger from Gentiles, danger in the city, danger in the wilderness, danger at sea, danger from false brethren; [27] in toil and hardship, through many a sleepless night, in hunger and thirst, often without food, in cold and exposure. [28] And, apart from other things, there is the daily pressure upon me of my anxiety for all the churches.

St. Paul was a sign of contradiction in his own time. St Paul’s writings are a sign of contradiction in our own time. Women’s ordination and so called homosexual rights do not find support in St. Paul’s epistles. For this reason Progressive theologians around the world – i.e. those for whom Scripture and the teaching of the church throughout the centuries are starting points rather than anchors – condemn Paul’s teaching as reactionary and provincial … strident and abusive. But then these same groups consider the teaching of John Paul II and Benedict XVI to be strident and abusive. God’s word is an anchor for the soul … not an out of date encumbrance to progress. And St. Paul’s epistles are a part of God’s word. To love the word of God and to seek to live it is to identify with the Jesus, the Word of God made flesh, and to become a sign that is spoken against.


4. Paul’s love for God

It helps to remember that all the issues of life reduce to just one:

“… The Lord our God, the Lord is one; and you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind, and with all your strength.'” Mark 12.29, 30

In Luke 10 we read the story of Martha and Mary:

.[Martha] had a sister called Mary, who sat at the Lord's feet and listened to his teaching. [40] But Martha was distracted with much serving; and she went to [Jesus] and said, "Lord, do you not care that my sister has left me to serve alone? Tell her then to help me." [41] But the Lord answered her, Martha, Martha, you are anxious and troubled about many things; [42] one thing is needful. Mary has chosen the good portion, which shall not be taken away from her." (Luke 10.38-42)

At the same time Jesus reminds us that love for God has requirements,
"If you love me, you will keep my commandments.” Further on he says, “He who has my commandments and keeps them, he it is who loves me; and he who loves me will be loved by my Father, and I will love him and manifest myself to him." (John 14.15, 21)

St. Paul loved the Lord. His love for the Lord in addition to his love for God’s truth qualified him to be a sign of contradiction. If we love the Lord Jesus and seek to live his truth we will ourselves find that we are signs of contradiction. Here is how St. Paul described his own relationship with the Lord”

[8] Indeed I count everything as loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord. For his sake I have suffered the loss of all things, and count them as refuse, in order that I may gain Christ [9] and be found in him, not having a righteousness of my own, based on law, but that which is through faith in Christ, the righteousness from God that depends on faith; [10] that I may know him and the power of his resurrection, and may share his sufferings, becoming like him in his death, [11] that if possible I may attain the resurrection from the dead. [12] Not that I have already obtained this or am already perfect; but I press on to make it my own, because Christ Jesus has made me his own. [13] Brethren, I do not consider that I have made it my own; but one thing I do, forgetting what lies behind and straining forward to what lies ahead, [14] I press on toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus. [15] Let those of us who are mature be thus minded; and if in anything you are otherwise minded, God will reveal that also to you. (Phil 3.7-16)

Conclusion
Jesus is the great sign of contradiction the Father has given to the world. Next week we begin the journey of identifying with our Lord in His suffering death and resurrection. Jesus came into the world on a mission. He accomplished that mission. He became the source of salvation for all who come to him in faith. We too are in the world on a mission. Let us make sure we accomplish that mission in whatever role he has placed us. What a tremendous glorious blessing it is to have been called to His side.

[1] …since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us also lay aside every weight, and sin which clings so closely, and let us run with perseverance the race that is set before us, [2] looking to Jesus the pioneer and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is seated at the right hand of the throne of God. [3] Consider him who endured from sinners such hostility against himself, so that you may not grow weary or fainthearted.

Endnotes
1 John 14.6 “Jesus said to him, ‘I am the way, and the truth, and the life; no one comes to the Father, but by me.’”

2 Mortimer Adler, How To Think About The Great Ideas

3 Douglas Farrow, “Kangaroo Canada” First Things Aug / Sep 2008, p19

4 Ibid, p18

5 1 Cor 13: [9] For our knowledge is imperfect and our prophecy is imperfect; [12] For now we see in a mirror dimly, but then face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall understand fully, even as I have been fully understood.

6 Lev 12.2-6, Ex 13.2 & 12, Num 3.13

7 The interpretation of the Navarre Bible, a Catholic bible commentary, cited in Wikipedia

8 Wisdom 2.8 ff: “and there is no remedy when a man comes to his end, and no one has been known to return from Hades. [2] Because we were born by mere chance, and hereafter we shall be as though we had never been; because the breath in our nostrils is smoke, and reason is a spark kindled by the beating of our hearts. [3] When it is extinguished, the body will turn to ashes, and the spirit will dissolve like empty air. [4] Our name will be forgotten in time and no one will remember our works; our life will pass away like the traces of a cloud, and be scattered like mist that is chased by the rays of the sun and overcome by its heat. [5] For our allotted time is the passing of a shadow, and there is no return from our death, because it is sealed up and no one turns back….]

9 Oakes, Edward in reply to the article “The Life in Humanae Vitae,” First Things Jan 2009, p8

10 Acts 9: [3] Now as [Paul] journeyed he approached Damascus, and suddenly a light from heaven flashed about him. [4] And he fell to the ground and heard a voice saying to him, "Saul, Saul, why do you persecute me?" [5] And he said, "Who are you, Lord?" And he said, "I am Jesus, whom you are persecuting; [6] but rise and enter the city, and you will be told what you are to do." [7] The men who were traveling with him stood speechless, hearing the voice but seeing no one.

11 Paul tells the Galatians: 13] “For you have heard of my former life in Judaism, how I persecuted the church of God violently and tried to destroy it; [14] and I advanced in Judaism beyond many of my own age among my people, so extremely zealous was I for the traditions of my fathers. [15] But when he who had set me apart before I was born, and had called me through his grace, [16] was pleased to reveal his Son to me, in order that I might preach him among the Gentiles, I did not confer with flesh and blood, [17] nor did I go up to Jerusalem to those who were apostles before me, but I went away into Arabia; and again I returned to Damascus. “

12 Ibid

13 2 Peter 3 [15] And count the forbearance of our Lord as salvation. So also our beloved brother Paul wrote to you according to the wisdom given him, [16] speaking of this as he does in all his letters. There are some things in them hard to understand, which the ignorant and unstable twist to their own destruction, as they do the other scriptures.

Stations of the Cross

STATIONS OF THE CROSS

The 40 days before the celebration of the Resurrection of Jesus on Easter morning give us the opportunity to reflect in depth about the great work and ministry of our Lord and savior Jesus Christ in accomplishing salvation for the world. This work began in eternity past before the beginning of time in the mind of God. It came to fruition in time though in the incarnation, life, death and resurrection of the Son of God, Jesus of Nazareth.

The four Gospels give us four views of the same event. These descriptions may be collated and compared with the Old Testament prophecy that foretold this great event in the life of the Messiah. To the scripture we can add our own somber reflection on what these events mean to us personally. A verse or two of a hymn may be used at the completion of reflection on each event. The words below can be used to introduce each reflection:

“We adore Thee O Christ and we praise Thee. /
Because by Thy holy cross Thou hast redeemed the world.”

1. The Transfiguration: Jesus discusses
His mission with Elijah and Moses
(and Peter James and John) Luke 9.28-31
2. Agony in the garden Mark 14.26 – 42
3. Betrayal and Arrest Mark 14.43 – 52
4. Sanhedrin condemns Jesus Mark 14.53 – 65; Ps 2
5. Peter denies Jesus Mark 14.66 – 72
6. Jesus first appearance before Pilate Mark 15.1; Luke 23.2-6
7. Jesus sent to Herod Luke 23.7 – 12
8. Jesus second appearance before Pilate Luke 23.13 – 25
9. Jesus is scourged, crowned with
thorns and mocked by Roman soldiers John 19.1, Mark 15.16-20b
10. Jesus appears before the crowd
And Pilate examines Him John 19.4 – 16
11. Jesus is helped by Simon of Cyrene Mark 15.21
12. Jesus meets the women of Jerusalem Luke 23.27 – 31
13. Jesus is stripped naked, nailed to the cross
and crucified at 0900 Mark 15.22 – 32
14. Jesus promises paradise to the penitent
thief and darkness descends at 1200 Luke 23. 33, 39 – 44
15. Jesus speaks to his mother and disciple John 19.25 – 27
16. Jesus dies on the cross at 1500 Mark 15.33 – 36; John 19.28 – 30; 15.38 – 41
17. The burial of Jesus Mark 15.42 – 47; John 19.31 – 42
18. The Resurrection of Jesus Mark 16.1 - 8

The Inauguration and Public Prayer

An article in the Wall Street Journal on Saturday complained that in an increasingly pluralistic America public prayer at the inauguration of the President have become increasingly “inclusivistic”. The author suggests that public prayer should either become generic so that it includes all Americans or it should be eliminated from the schedule of events. A similar situation has hovered over chaplains in the armed forces for at least the last 25 years (the period I was on active duty). It came to a head when Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld directed that prayer should be generic or eliminated from public events such as changes of command. How should we think of public prayer in America?

A place to start is be asking the question: “What is prayer?” A reasonable definition is the lifting up of one’s heart to God. This is true whether the prayer is private or public. When an individual prays publically he or she is still lifting up the heart to God and in this case verbalizing the thoughts of the heart.

Prayer is addressed TO SOMEONE! When a person prays publicly the prayer is addressed: to “Someone.” I mean here that God has a Name of some sort for all human persons who Address God. For the Moslem his heart is lifted up to the God of Allah. For the Jew the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob is addressed presumably. For the Wiccan I suppose it would be Mother Earth or some such concept. The point is that prayer by its very nature is addressed to the deity not to the people listening to or overhearing the prayer that is said publicly. It is in the nature of the prayer that it is a direct address to a Person / God. To force the content of prayer to meet the pressures of political correctness is to lose entirely the idea of prayer: i.e. the lifting up of the heart to God. It is furthermore to create a new religion and a new God: “the religion and the God that is approved for public utterance in the U.S.”

There may be some people who believe in “the God of the religion approved for public utterance in the United States” but I haven’t met any. Real people’s religious beliefs are very specific. What I mean here is what an individual really believes about God and religion is very specific.

To say that public prayer has become non- inclusive or intolerant is to totally miss the point about prayer. Prayer is from one heart (the prayer) to another (God). Pluralism in America should be about encouraging each individual to live out his or her belief in God. Jews need to be Jews; Moslems need to be Moslems; and Christians Christians; etc. It is no good trying to reduce different beliefs for public relationship. We all share the fact that we are Americans. As long as each can pray for the good of all then each should pray to God as he or she believe in God. Then and only then will the one leading public prayer actually be leading real Americans in prayer.

By the way persons in America are free not to believe in God. To put that another way no one is forced to believe in God in any way in America. That is good because it is also common sense. That freedom does not constitute a right though to inhibit the public expression in America in any way… in my humble point of view.

J.R.R.Tolkien, C.S. Lewis and some simple thoughts on the nature of evil

29 March 2007

A place to start in the Christian life is with an understanding of the nature of evil. There are two basic views concerning the nature of evil. Tolkien and Lewis help clarify these views. The Bible gives necessary background. Here are the two views:

1. Manichean dualism. In this view evil and good war continuously with neither seeming ever to win the day.

2. Christianity. The view of Biblical Christianity as expressed in Scripture and in the view of Boethius, a 6th century Roman philosopher and Christian, is that evil is an absence of the goodness that begins in God. This absence allows the influence of demonic forces in human persons and an apparent battle between good and evil in which neither side seems to win the day. A day will come, however, when with the return of Christ to the world there will be no place in the universe that absents the goodness of God. In that day there will be no evil.

The most famous philosophical statement of the orthodox Christian view of evil is that of Boethius, a Roman senator in the early 6the century AD. De Consolatione Philosophe, “Of the Consolation of Philosophy,” was written while Boethius, a Christian, was in prison waiting to die on charges of plotting to restore Imperial rule. Boethius was tortured to death in 524/525 AD. His reflection was not idle mental meandering. He was struggling with the thing itself... with evil. “The Boethian view is that evil is not something in itself. What people identify as evil is actually the absence of good.” [1]

Tolkien struggled with the nature of evil. He spent time in the British Army and served in the Battle of the Somme, one of the most famous apparently useless expenditures of human life in the history of warfare. Tom Shippey notes that Tolkien was one of many authors in the 20th century who had served in the century’s "great wars" and struggled to understand the nature of their experience of evil.

Tolkien’s view is expressed throughout The Lord of The Rings. Frodo comments to Sam in the Tower of Cirith Ungal that evil cannot create ... “not real new things of its own.” This illustrates the Boethian view or the orthodox Christian view of the nature of evil. C.S. Lewis adds in Mere Christianity, “… furthermore evil was not created; it arose when human beings exercised their own free will in withdrawing their service and their intentions from God; in the end when the divine plan has been fulfilled all evils may be annulled, cancelled, brought to good, as the Fall of Man was by the Incarnation and the Death of Christ.”[2]

Some evidence for and against the Boethian view is as follows. All who do evil excuse themselves in terms of what is good. Therefore evil is an absence of good. Evil is a parasite not an original thing. An illustration are the Orcs in Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings. Though the Orcs are understood to be "forces of evil" they admire and condemn based on their own moral judgments of the good.

One may add that Bible suggests that human persons are greatly influenced by spiritual forces. Spiritual forces are ultimately either of God and the light (angels, e.g.) or they are forces of the darkness and followers of the angels who rebelled against God, that is Satan and his followers (demons). A person not influenced by benevolent spiritual forces, one who is empty so to speak of spiritual influences for good, is capable of being influenced by demonic forces.

Though evil is not something in and of itself - but rather the absence of something else (the good of God) - evil does express itself in the world human persons inhabit. Whenever evil does express itself good is in opposition to it. It is in the nature of Reality that in the spirit world the forces of darkness are in every instance opposed to the forces of light.

Though on the spiritual plane these two forces are always clearly delineated on the human plane there is often considerable shadow. An example is the allied opposition to Hitler's war machine in World War II. Though the allies were not uniformly expressions of the forces of light and Hitler's war machine was not uniformly an expression of the forces of darkness the allies were clearly forces of good in their opposition to the Nazi forces of darkness and evil.


[1] JRR Tolkien: Author of the Century. Shippey, Tom. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 2002.
[2] Ibid, 131