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Source: (consider it) Thread: Purgatory: Pacifism
Baptist Trainfan
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I knew of a Baptist minister in London in the 1930s who was strongly Pacifist and gathered quite a lot of supporters around him.

Some months into WW2 he became increasingly concerned about Hitler's aims and ethics, and changed his tune, now supporting the War. He felt that actively resisting Hitler was the lesser of two evils. It was a very controversial move and he eventually had to leave his church.

I am sure that this man would never have been a "militarist" or (perish the word) a "war-monger"; I guess too that he (like Bishop Bell) might have been unhappy with actions such as the carpet-bombing of German cities. Nevertheless this is an example of high-minded idealism being modified by stark realities.

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Martin60
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That's what happens when we let go of Christ: we've never grasped Him in the first place.

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Love wins

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Pre-cambrian
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quote:
Originally posted by cliffdweller:
quote:
Originally posted by Pre-cambrian:

Denmark was overrun by the Germans in one day having been totally taken by surprise. Until then Denmark too was neutral, not pacifist. What is your evidence for claiming that the subsequent Danish response to occupation, including the successful evacuation of the Jews, was down to pacifism?

It was an active response to evil, and was non-violent.
And it wasn't pacifist, unless you can show it was a result of following a deliberate policy of non-violence on moral grounds.

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"We cannot leave the appointment of Bishops to the Holy Ghost, because no one is confident that the Holy Ghost would understand what makes a good Church of England bishop."

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Barnabas62
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quote:
Originally posted by Pre-cambrian:
And it wasn't pacifist, unless you can show it was a result of following a deliberate policy of non-violence on moral grounds.

This is a central point. Is pacifism a free lifestyle choice and oppression a testing ground of the commitment to that choice? Or does the oppression itself provide the background for pacifism to emerge?

I think Civil Disobedience, Gandhi or MLK version, did spring out of prior moral convictions, but there are also good grounds for believing that both Gandhi and MLK saw that it had value in seizing the moral high ground - on the way to the desired social change. They foresaw its effectiveness and I think that was also a factor in the leadership they provided.

Whereas as a prior moral choice, a pacifist lifestyle has nothing to do with effectiveness, it's primarily a belief that it is the right way to live, regardless of outcome.

[ 14. November 2013, 09:00: Message edited by: Barnabas62 ]

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mdijon
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quote:
Originally posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard:
That's what happens when we let go of Christ: we've never grasped Him in the first place.

Pacifism clearly doesn't preclude a presumptive dismissive comment on what appears to be an account of a principled man agonizing over his stand.

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Barnabas62
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Yes. Good people wrestle with the moral dilemmas, weigh up consequences.

I guess there will always be paradoxes in learning what it really means to try to love your enemies. I'm kind of bothered by anyone who finds them straightforward. Maybe because I don't?

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Who is it that you seek? How then shall we live? How shall we sing the Lord's song in a strange land?

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Laurelin
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quote:
Originally posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard:
That's what happens when we let go of Christ: we've never grasped Him in the first place.

Easy for you to judge.

Tell that to Dietrich Bonhoeffer.

quote:
Originally posted by Barnabas62:
Yes. Good people wrestle with the moral dilemmas, weigh up consequences.

I guess there will always be paradoxes in learning what it really means to try to love your enemies. I'm kind of bothered by anyone who finds them straightforward. Maybe because I don't?

I agree. [Frown]

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Marvin the Martian

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quote:
Originally posted by Jade Constable:
By gutless (and certainly 'collaborator') I meant the person being prepared to welcome a Nazi government

Out of interest, does that mean that every single person in Germany, Austria, France, Holland, Belgium, Denmark, Poland or any of the other German-occupied territories in the Second World War who didn't actively oppose the Nazis was a gutless collaborator? Is there any room in your worldview for anyone who was just trying to keep themselves and their loved ones alive, or is it a binary, black-and-white worldview where people are either fighting to the death or gutless cowards?

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Martin60
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Jade Constable will speak for herself, but I will too. This is all rhetoric Marvin the Martian. Black and white don't come in to it except as devices. The failure is ALWAYS with the Church. Ordinary, decent Germans, just like us, by the literal million, did the Holocaust.

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Love wins

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Marvin the Martian

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quote:
Originally posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard:
Black and white don't come in to it except as devices.

Devices that have been - and no doubt will again be - used to send millions of people to their deaths.

Fighting back is a valid response to evil, but so is trying to survive it. People shouldn't be condemned just for doing what they can to stay alive.

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Hail Gallaxhar

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Martin60
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Riiiiiiight. If you say so MtM.

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Love wins

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Hawk

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quote:
Originally posted by Marvin the Martian:
quote:
Originally posted by Hawk:
And sometimes there are worse evils than shooting people.

I disagree. Death is the ultimate evil, the only thing that utterly precludes any future joy, contentment or peace. Anything else can be worked through and survived. Death cannot.
So being slowly tortured to death over a period of weeks is better than being shot outright?
What about watching your family being starved, tortured, beaten, dehumanised and eventually dying? Is that better than dying yourself? If a mother in the concentration camps thought that by her death she could protect her child from living a year in the camp I am sure she would have chosen so. Other people in extreme situations of war have killed their children, their wives and themselves outright to prevent them from falling into the hands of the enemy – knowing what horrors would await them if they did.

Claiming death is the ultimate evil and only evil worth talking about just shows a blasé ignorance of the realities of evil.

But I’ve said before you have a tendency to oversimplify the situation to make difficult questions easier for you to answer. You obviously disagree that there is anything worse or comparable to death and have no intention of changing your mind whatever I say.

quote:
Originally posted by Marvin the Martian:
quote:
Originally posted by Hawk:
We can see the effects of an unrestrained ideology which cares nothing for human lives in the lessons of Lenin and Stalin's Russia and Mao's China - which exterminated around 40-70 million and more because they considered such deaths to be nothing compared to the goals of the Party.

Fun fact - neither Stalin nor Mao were brought to an end by armed conflict. Yet end their reigns did.
I’m glad you’re having fun. You’re right that evil ends eventually. I’m sure eventually even the North Korean regime will end as well. I’m not sure that’s such a fun fact for the people who were abused and killed at the time though.

[ 14. November 2013, 13:23: Message edited by: Hawk ]

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See my blog for 'interesting' thoughts

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Marvin the Martian

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quote:
Originally posted by Hawk:
quote:
Originally posted by Marvin the Martian:
quote:
Originally posted by Hawk:
And sometimes there are worse evils than shooting people.

I disagree. Death is the ultimate evil, the only thing that utterly precludes any future joy, contentment or peace. Anything else can be worked through and survived. Death cannot.
So being slowly tortured to death over a period of weeks is better than being shot outright?
What about watching your family being starved, tortured, beaten, dehumanised and eventually dying? Is that better than dying yourself? If a mother in the concentration camps thought that by her death she could protect her child from living a year in the camp I am sure she would have chosen so. Other people in extreme situations of war have killed their children, their wives and themselves outright to prevent them from falling into the hands of the enemy – knowing what horrors would await them if they did.

Claiming death is the ultimate evil and only evil worth talking about just shows a blasé ignorance of the realities of evil.

There are better and worse ways to die, sure. But as long as life is an option death is a worse one.

quote:
But I’ve said before you have a tendency to oversimplify the situation to make difficult questions easier for you to answer. You obviously disagree that there is anything worse or comparable to death and have no intention of changing your mind whatever I say.
Fair enough.

quote:
I’m glad you’re having fun. You’re right that evil ends eventually. I’m sure eventually even the North Korean regime will end as well. I’m not sure that’s such a fun fact for the people who were abused and killed at the time though.
No, it's not. Not at all, and that's not what I've been saying.

There are two things I am saying:

1/ Life in North Korea may be shit, but it's better than being dead.

2/ I do not consider it a valid option to trade one set of deaths for another. The persecuted people of North Korea are not more deserving of life than the people who would be killed in the battles to free them.

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Hail Gallaxhar

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no prophet's flag is set so...

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No sure if this is totally true. Been through a couple of episodes where I thought to exchange my life in exchange for different than what we faced was preferable. God doesn't discuss such matters it seems, prayers generally going into the Godly void. I detected for myself, it has been an age related change plus terrible life events.

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Out of this nettle, danger, we pluck this flower, safety.
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Pomona
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quote:
Originally posted by Marvin the Martian:
quote:
Originally posted by Jade Constable:
By gutless (and certainly 'collaborator') I meant the person being prepared to welcome a Nazi government

Out of interest, does that mean that every single person in Germany, Austria, France, Holland, Belgium, Denmark, Poland or any of the other German-occupied territories in the Second World War who didn't actively oppose the Nazis was a gutless collaborator? Is there any room in your worldview for anyone who was just trying to keep themselves and their loved ones alive, or is it a binary, black-and-white worldview where people are either fighting to the death or gutless cowards?
I can't speak for non-Christians here since I am speaking purely from a Christian standpoint, but that seems to me to be pretty contrary to Christ's command to follow Him above family. But in general, only wanting to keep yourself and your loved ones alive does seems cowardly or at least selfish (despite what Mudfrog says, the opposite of pacifism which is putting someone else's life above your own). There are surely more important things than one's own life.

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Consider the work of God: Who is able to straighten what he has bent? [Ecclesiastes 7:13]

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Pomona
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quote:
Originally posted by Laurelin:
quote:
Originally posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard:
That's what happens when we let go of Christ: we've never grasped Him in the first place.

Easy for you to judge.

Tell that to Dietrich Bonhoeffer.

quote:
Originally posted by Barnabas62:
Yes. Good people wrestle with the moral dilemmas, weigh up consequences.

I guess there will always be paradoxes in learning what it really means to try to love your enemies. I'm kind of bothered by anyone who finds them straightforward. Maybe because I don't?

I agree. [Frown]

While I could never say that Bonhoeffer was never a Christian to begin with or that he lost his faith (and The Bonhoeffer Trust does a lot of work with SCM so I know his work and life well), I do think his actions that endorsed/sought to carry out violence were in denial of the Gospel. I'm not saying it's unforgivable - surely more forgivable than St Peter's denial of Christ and look how he ended up - but a denial of Christ nontheless.

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Consider the work of God: Who is able to straighten what he has bent? [Ecclesiastes 7:13]

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Barnabas62
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Try walking in his moccasins?

I'm nearer to WW2 than you, I guess, and my late father was involved in the clearance and rehabbing of concentration camp victims in the immediate post war period. He had nightmares about his experiences for years.

It is hard for any of us who haven't lived in a totalitarian regime governed by a mad man to fully come to terms with the impact of the control by fear such people generate, the evil they are responsible for.

I really do not think it is fair for any of us to judge Bonhoeffer's ethics from the comfort of our armchairs. To slightly misquote Thomas Moore from a Man for All Seasons, there were very good reasons for 'the tangle in Bonhoeffer's mind'.

Why not simply suspend such academic judgments and leave the judging to God? It is also a Christian principle that we will be judged in the manner we judge.

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Who is it that you seek? How then shall we live? How shall we sing the Lord's song in a strange land?

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Barnabas62
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Try walking in his moccasins?

I'm nearer to WW2 than you, I guess, and my late father was involved in the clearance and rehabbing of concentration camp victims in the immediate post war period. He had nightmares about his experiences for years.

It is hard for any of us who haven't lived in a totalitarian regime governed by a mad man to fully come to terms with the impact of the control by fear such people generate, the evil they are responsible for.

I really do not think it is fair for any of us to judge Bonhoeffer's ethics from the comfort of our armchairs. To slightly misquote Thomas Moore from a Man for All Seasons, there were very good reasons for 'the tangle in Bonhoeffer's mind'.

Why not simply suspend such academic judgments and leave the judging to God? It is also a Christian principle that we will be judged in the manner we judge.

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Who is it that you seek? How then shall we live? How shall we sing the Lord's song in a strange land?

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cliffdweller
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My understanding is that Bonhoeffer himself understood his eventual and reluctant choice to (attempt) a violent act for the greater good of stopping an unspeakable evil to be a lesser choice, made necessary because of the failure of the Christian church to respond more quickly and decisively to that evil. iow, if we had acted earlier, and had been united as a church in opposing Hitler, we would have been able to do so non-violently. Bonhoeffer was willing to accept divine judgment for his actions, standing in as it were for the failure of the entire Christian church.

As paradoxical as it seems to call Bonhoeffer a "pacifist", most still would, and I believe he would probably want to be thought of that way. I would also find him a worthy example of pacifism at it's best-- one that wrestles with the hard questions, refusing to view the world in simplistic black-and-white terms but willing to really struggle with the messiness of real-life ethical engagement.

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Pomona
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quote:
Originally posted by Barnabas62:
Try walking in his moccasins?

I'm nearer to WW2 than you, I guess, and my late father was involved in the clearance and rehabbing of concentration camp victims in the immediate post war period. He had nightmares about his experiences for years.

It is hard for any of us who haven't lived in a totalitarian regime governed by a mad man to fully come to terms with the impact of the control by fear such people generate, the evil they are responsible for.

I really do not think it is fair for any of us to judge Bonhoeffer's ethics from the comfort of our armchairs. To slightly misquote Thomas Moore from a Man for All Seasons, there were very good reasons for 'the tangle in Bonhoeffer's mind'.

Why not simply suspend such academic judgments and leave the judging to God? It is also a Christian principle that we will be judged in the manner we judge.

Killing an enemy = contrary to Christ's teachings. The idea that if Hitler went then fascism would also disappear is also rather misguided. Of course it was a decision which caused him agony and it's not like I said in my previous comment that it's unforgivable. It probably considered necessary at the time. But it's still going against explicit teachings of Jesus on violence and how to deal with enemies. How else are we supposed to interpret it, when Jesus is so clear on the subject?

Re being judged in the manner that we judge others....I would totally expect to be judged in that way regarding things I've done that are totally opposed to Jesus' clear teachings. I would also repent and expect forgiveness, but I wouldn't expect those things to not be called sinful in the first place.

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Consider the work of God: Who is able to straighten what he has bent? [Ecclesiastes 7:13]

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Kaplan Corday
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quote:
Originally posted by Jade Constable:
I could never say that Bonhoeffer was never a Christian to begin with or that he lost his faith

That's awfully big of you.
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Pomona
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quote:
Originally posted by Kaplan Corday:
quote:
Originally posted by Jade Constable:
I could never say that Bonhoeffer was never a Christian to begin with or that he lost his faith

That's awfully big of you.
[Roll Eyes]

I was responding to Martin's assessment of Bonhoeffer. Obviously Bonhoeffer was a Christian!

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Consider the work of God: Who is able to straighten what he has bent? [Ecclesiastes 7:13]

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mdijon
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I think Kaplan's sarcasm is directed at the spectacle of you judging his actions as a denial of Christ from the comfort of your internet connection in a liberal democracy, and offering the crumb of comfort that you don't deny his Christianity. Fantastic.

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Pomona
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quote:
Originally posted by mdijon:
I think Kaplan's sarcasm is directed at the spectacle of you judging his actions as a denial of Christ from the comfort of your internet connection in a liberal democracy, and offering the crumb of comfort that you don't deny his Christianity. Fantastic.

But how is that fair? Not exactly my fault I live in a liberal democracy, is it? While I empathise with Bonhoeffer's actions and don't think they're unforgivable, they also go against Christ's explicit teachings. So what am I supposed to say? That disobeying Christ is OK if it's someone on our side? Or that Hitler ultimately losing means it doesn't matter? Whether or not I would do the same as Bonhoeffer in his position doesn't exactly change the Bible, does it?

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Consider the work of God: Who is able to straighten what he has bent? [Ecclesiastes 7:13]

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mdijon
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quote:
Originally posted by Jade Constable:
So what am I supposed to say? That disobeying Christ is OK if it's someone on our side? Or that Hitler ultimately losing means it doesn't matter? Whether or not I would do the same as Bonhoeffer in his position doesn't exactly change the Bible, does it?

You are supposed to say something that recognizes that you are going up against a man of very serious Christian conviction and deep thought on the matter, who wrestled long and hard with a particularly difficult situation, and that maybe there's a possibility that the bible doesn't say exactly what you think it says. I'm not saying you have to agree with him, but to view him as obviously wrong without pause for reflection seems rather blasé.

[ETA - there are a number of dead horse issues where you would see some Christians using similar language about their position. You would presumably expect them to extend you something of the same courtesy in their view of your obvious denial of Christ on the matter?]

[ 15. November 2013, 06:37: Message edited by: mdijon ]

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Pomona
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Because I missed the edit window - in what ways are Bonhoeffer's actions obeying Christ (being literal not sarcastic here)? Perhaps sin is a better term to use than denial of Christ, although to me they mean the same thing. But certainly my judgement of Bonhoeffer's actions isn't intended as judgemental, just as a statement of fact - surely if one is going against what Jesus teaches in the Gospels, then that's sinful? That's not me saying it's the wrong decision to make.

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Consider the work of God: Who is able to straighten what he has bent? [Ecclesiastes 7:13]

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mdijon
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Maybe what Jesus taught in the gospels was not a simple set of rules that we can all agree on as cut and dried.

For instance have you ever referred to anyone as "father"? or as "good" for that matter? Have you always given to those who ask things of you and walked extra miles?

And would you argue that you ought to correct your behaviour in these things?

[ 15. November 2013, 06:47: Message edited by: mdijon ]

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Pomona
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quote:
Originally posted by mdijon:
quote:
Originally posted by Jade Constable:
So what am I supposed to say? That disobeying Christ is OK if it's someone on our side? Or that Hitler ultimately losing means it doesn't matter? Whether or not I would do the same as Bonhoeffer in his position doesn't exactly change the Bible, does it?

You are supposed to say something that recognizes that you are going up against a man of very serious Christian conviction and deep thought on the matter, who wrestled long and hard with a particularly difficult situation, and that maybe there's a possibility that the bible doesn't say exactly what you think it says. I'm not saying you have to agree with him, but to view him as obviously wrong without pause for reflection seems rather blasé.

[ETA - there are a number of dead horse issues where you would see some Christians using similar language about their position. You would presumably expect them to extend you something of the same courtesy in their view of your obvious denial of Christ on the matter?]

But I'm not saying he's automatically wrong? Just that what he did is contrary to what Jesus teaches. It's not even like these are massively nuanced bits of teaching either, or difficult parables to unpack - just that we are to avoid violence and love our enemies. The latter could, admittedly, involve the death of the enemy.

Re the Dead Horses issues, Jesus doesn't say anything/much on those subjects, so it requires a rather different approach. I'm not really sure how I would expect them to react to it? I would expect people to react as they usually do personally. If you mean how I would want them to react, that's up to them and it doesn't particularly bother me either way.

I just don't really agonise over decisions? I just go with the one with most pros or fewest cons and stick with it. While obviously, living in a liberal democracy limits the difficulty of the decisions I have had to make, I would say that mine have been on the upper end of difficulty for the average UK resident (homelessness etc) - so I don't think it's from having an easy life, it's just not something I can empathise with. I dunno, Aspie binary thinking maybe? Not using any Aspie-ness as an excuse, just a possible reason for it.

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Consider the work of God: Who is able to straighten what he has bent? [Ecclesiastes 7:13]

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Pomona
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quote:
Originally posted by mdijon:
Maybe what Jesus taught in the gospels was not a simple set of rules that we can all agree on as cut and dried.

For instance have you ever referred to anyone as "father"? or as "good" for that matter? Have you always given to those who ask things of you and walked extra miles?

And would you argue that you ought to correct your behaviour in these things?

Yes, but I would certainly say that I should correct my behaviour in these things (and have done so, to the best of my knowledge but also obviously repent for those incidents I've missed).

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Consider the work of God: Who is able to straighten what he has bent? [Ecclesiastes 7:13]

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mdijon
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I'm having a hard time believing that you're going to try and catch yourself every time you refer to someone as good. Or as a teacher, for instance. What will you do, preface the words by some formula like "working as what others would refer to as a teacher"?

I also find it hard to believe that you really think that every time someone asks you to do something or give them something that the right thing is to hand it over immediately.

Or is there a possibility that some degree of interpretation is required?

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mdijon nojidm uoɿıqɯ ɯqıɿou
ɯqıɿou uoɿıqɯ nojidm mdijon

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Kaplan Corday
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I'm reminded of some of Whitefield's followers (though not Whitefield himself) who seriously discussed whether the Wesley brothers would be in Heaven.
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Barnabas62
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Jade, it's taken me a long time to come to terms with the paradoxical elements of Christian discipleship and I'm not there yet. [Trevor Miller of the Northumbria Community is very good on that issue and there's a rather good CD/talk by him available from the Community's website if you're interested].

I'm intrigued by the paradoxical elements in Jesus' teachings. In one place, he who is not for us is against us; in another, he who is not against us is for us! Surely both statements cannot be true? Well, not unless you factor in the theme of times and seasons. Some seasons seem very desperate and seem to call for desperate measures. Is that a temptation, or a recognition that the good can sometimes be hard to find?

Of course, on one level, you are right. The transgression of the 6th Commandment is clear enough. But I think cliffdweller is right too about the messiness of RL ethical choices, particularly in desperate situations.

I'm sure this comes across as relativising, unclear. A kind of "greying" of principle. I'm well aware of the dangers of doing that, of making excuses. But I am very hesitant to jump to any firm conclusions about how Bonhoeffer's intentions and actions should be judged. Or even whether I need to make any such personal judgments about a man who is dead.

I think it's good to practise being slow to judge. Of course you're entitled to your opinion and I accept your sincerity. I guess I'm encouraging a bit of a pause for thought, some consideration about what being fair might mean in this case.

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Dave W.
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quote:
Originally posted by Barnabas62:
I'm intrigued by the paradoxical elements in Jesus' teachings. In one place, he who is not for us is against us; in another, he who is not against us is for us! Surely both statements cannot be true?

I don't see why not. It works if the set of all people is divided into two subsets: those who are for us (A) and those who are against us (B). Jesus' two statements are consistent with the idea that those two subsets are complementary - together they imply both that there's no overlap (no one is both for and against us, A∩B=∅) and no third set (everyone is either against us, A∪B=U.)
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quote:
Originally posted by Dave W.:
quote:
Originally posted by Barnabas62:
I'm intrigued by the paradoxical elements in Jesus' teachings. In one place, he who is not for us is against us; in another, he who is not against us is for us! Surely both statements cannot be true?

I don't see why not. It works if the set of all people is divided into two subsets: those who are for us (A) and those who are against us (B). Jesus' two statements are consistent with the idea that those two subsets are complementary - together they imply both that there's no overlap (no one is both for and against us, A∩B=∅) and no third set (everyone is either against us, A∪B=U.)
Yes, if you assume that Jesus was dolt enough to believe that everyone in the world had an opinion about His little group, you can save logic at the expense of reason.

--Tom Clune

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This space left blank intentionally.

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Martin60
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quote:

mpc: That's what happens when we let go of Christ: we've never grasped Him in the first place.
quote:

mdijon: Pacifism clearly doesn't preclude a presumptive dismissive comment on what appears to be an account of a principled man agonizing over his stand.


It's minimal for sure. Spartan. Hyperbolic. Because I know we ALL let go in extremis. That's OK. All. In dying, in dementia, in grief, in loss, in agony of any kind.

Just like Jesus did.

And in fact NONE of ever grasp Him in the first place any way.

Just like Jesus ...

...
quote:

Barnabas: Yes. Good people wrestle with the moral dilemmas, weigh up consequences.

I guess there will always be paradoxes in learning what it really means to try to love your enemies. I'm kind of bothered by anyone who finds them straightforward. Maybe because I don't?
quote:

mpc: Me too Barnabas. It's easy to say. Easy to lose it. To err is human. Therefore divine.


...
quote:

mpc: Black and white don't come in to it except as devices.
quote:

MtM: Devices that have been - and no doubt will again be - used to send millions of people to their deaths.
quote:

mpc: Riiiiiiight. If you say so MtM.

Fighting back is a valid response to evil, but so is trying to survive it. People shouldn't be condemned just for doing what they can to stay alive.


I'm sorry for my response to your first sentence. And I take the point that slogans kill. Nobody is condemning anybody.

...

Jade, I made no assessment of ...

Bonhoeffer - I'm not fit to wipe the dog shit off his moccasins. He was a saint all the way as far as I'm concerned.

A saint in losing his compass when faced with the temptation to do something about evil on the vilest and greatest scale.

Only one man wouldn't have.

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Love wins

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mdijon
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quote:
Originally posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard:
A saint in losing his compass when faced with the temptation to do something about evil on the vilest and greatest scale.

Says you. But I don't think temptation is the right term. He disagreed with what was right to do. It wasn't as if he believe it was wrong, but in a moment of weakness gave in to anger or some other negative emotion.

quote:
Originally posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard:
Bonhoeffer - I'm not fit to wipe the dog shit off his moccasins.

I wouldn't put it as strongly as that, but the sentiment ought to make you wonder if it you should be quite so clear in your judgement above.

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mdijon nojidm uoɿıqɯ ɯqıɿou
ɯqıɿou uoɿıqɯ nojidm mdijon

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Higgs Bosun
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quote:
Originally posted by Jade Constable:
Because I missed the edit window - in what ways are Bonhoeffer's actions obeying Christ (being literal not sarcastic here)? Perhaps sin is a better term to use than denial of Christ, although to me they mean the same thing. But certainly my judgement of Bonhoeffer's actions isn't intended as judgemental, just as a statement of fact - surely if one is going against what Jesus teaches in the Gospels, then that's sinful? That's not me saying it's the wrong decision to make.

With curious timing, a very similar dilemma was placed in the mind of Poirot by the writers of the last episode (broadcast on Wednesday). I found it very moving, even though not yet knowing the reason, when Poirot was clutching his cross and asking Hastings, "will God forgive me?"

When our conscience obliges us to follow a course of action which goes against the normal rules, then all we can do is cast ourselves on God's mercy.

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Martin60
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mdijon - it's the starkness of Jesus' example I keep seeing before me. It's taken nearly 60 years of being an armchair warrior to become an armchair pacifist.

And here I am quoting THE Baptist: "I always rejoice to find a soldier a Christian, but I always mourn to find a Christian a soldier" Spurgeon

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Love wins

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Dave W.
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quote:
Originally posted by tclune:
quote:
Originally posted by Dave W.:
quote:
Originally posted by Barnabas62:
I'm intrigued by the paradoxical elements in Jesus' teachings. In one place, he who is not for us is against us; in another, he who is not against us is for us! Surely both statements cannot be true?

I don't see why not. It works if the set of all people is divided into two subsets: those who are for us (A) and those who are against us (B). Jesus' two statements are consistent with the idea that those two subsets are complementary - together they imply both that there's no overlap (no one is both for and against us, A∩B=∅) and no third set (everyone is either against us, A∪B=U.)
Yes, if you assume that Jesus was dolt enough to believe that everyone in the world had an opinion about His little group, you can save logic at the expense of reason.

--Tom Clune

I don't think "having an opinion" has anything to do with it. It's more along the lines of Orwell's formulation that "pacifism is objectively pro-fascist" - a rhetorical statement meant to deny any middle ground of neutrality.

As to whether the grandiosity implied by the logical interpretation of the statements makes Jesus out to be a dolt - well, it seems to me that a Christian who is put off by the idea of Christ making grandiose statements is in rather an uncomfortable position, cause there's lots more where that came from.

In any case, there certainly doesn't seem to be anything paradoxical about the two statements taken together. If you object to the rhetoric and say there really are people who are neither for nor against Jesus, that just makes his statements wrong, not paradoxical.

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Pomona
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Haven't been ignoring this thread but have just been on retreat. Lots to think about (esp in the light of other threads in Purg at the moment) - hope 'thinking about it' doesn't seem like a cop-out!

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Consider the work of God: Who is able to straighten what he has bent? [Ecclesiastes 7:13]

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mdijon
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quote:
Originally posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard:
mdijon - it's the starkness of Jesus' example I keep seeing before me.

Again says you. If the argument is from example I would be less dogmatic. Jesus gave us quite a stark example in the temple with his whip, but I wouldn't generalize from that to very many other situations.

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mdijon nojidm uoɿıqɯ ɯqıɿou
ɯqıɿou uoɿıqɯ nojidm mdijon

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mdijon
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quote:
Originally posted by Jade Constable:
hope 'thinking about it' doesn't seem like a cop-out

Certainly not. The real cop-out is the knee jerk response.

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mdijon nojidm uoɿıqɯ ɯqıɿou
ɯqıɿou uoɿıqɯ nojidm mdijon

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Barnabas62
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Dave W

If you look at the contexts, "not against us is for us" implies a kind of imitation "from the outside". In an open season, there is a spectrum between support and opposition and also the possibility of a "neutral zone". In a closed season, people become much more polarised, there seems to be less room for those somewhere in the middle, the neutral zone disappears. That's my considered take on the apparent opposition of those statements.

It's an interesting topic for Kerygmania, maybe?

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Who is it that you seek? How then shall we live? How shall we sing the Lord's song in a strange land?

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