It’s been gnawing at the edges of my consciousness for a week or so: We who embrace ANE intellectual traditions are better able to operate objectively than those who embrace the Western mythology of objectivity.
Try to understand the psychology of it. Those who seek an objective standard to which they can appeal are like children. The concept of objective truth holds out the promise of grounds for coercive authority. Instead of taking the responsibility for the results, the disputant can deflect accountability by pointing to some external authority. This is directly counter to the spiritual measure of maturity, by which we assume full responsibility for our choices before God.
It is the child within us that cries out for God to implant some indisputable knowledge of right and wrong. We don’t want to do the work of entering into a living covenant with Him. We want stuff nailed down in concrete terms so we don’t have to keep working at improving our relationship with Him. This tension of never quite being sure about things and having to bear the costs of failure requires a maturity that gets good lip service, yet is excluded from the core of what it means to be Western.
You will surely encounter folks who demand you listen to their spiel about one thing or another. Care to discuss what’s happening in Gaza right now? You should expect to encounter harsh, polarizing comments immediately from the average human you encounter. There is no sin in refusing to discuss it with such people. No one on this earth can oblige you to absorb their passionate rants about their particular viewpoint.
That they would make such a demand identifies them as moral children. That is, they lack the moral foundation from which to discuss it in the first place. This isn’t about Gaza and what is justice there, but a matter of how we conduct ourselves as humans. The very foundation of our residence on this plane of existence is the glory of our Heavenly Father. He has made it all too clear in His revelation that precious little of what drives human endeavor is of interest to Him.
A fundamental element of His glory is human volition on behalf of that glory. There are plenty of issues in life where we are given no choice, but this one thing is fundamental to our very understanding of God: We can choose to participate in His glory. This is the one thing for which He holds all humanity accountable in this world. If you do not actively choose His glory, you have chosen to oppose Him. And you have to make that choice moment by moment, in each context as time rolls onward.
Yes, we could intelligently and morally comment on the bloodshed in Gaza. However, doing so requires we first pull everyone onto the same high moral plane. That means, at a minimum, that absolutist statements will always violate the rules of discussion. The mere possession of the notion that one or another position is logically compelling to end all debate is sin in itself. Such disqualifies anyone from opening their mouth in the first place.
Don’t put up with it. Shut them off. You can be as indulgent as your own calling and nature permit, but at some point it is contrary to their own best interest to keep yammering on about some imaginary compelling logic. The pretense of listening to that crap too long is itself an insult to God’s glory.
There is no right answer about Gaza. That such an issue exists reflects how long and how deeply people there have drunk from the well of lies. There are no good guys; they are all bad guys. So are you and I, but we are painfully conscious of it if we have any sense at all. Don’t take sides and don’t tolerate too long anyone who does.
