Which is the Real God

Which is the Real God

Xenophanes, a 4^th century BC Greek philosopher wrote: “The Ethiops say that their gods are flat-nosed and black, while the Thracians say that theirs have blue eyes and red hair. yet if cattle or horses or lions had hands and could draw, and could sculpt like men, then the horses would draw their gods like horses, and cattle like cattle; and each they would shape bodies of gods in the likeness, each kind, of their own.”

This was an astute observation. We all have a tendency to suppose God must be like us.

Sometimes this is fairly harmless: those of us who went to Sunday School half a century ago in an Anglo-Saxon community may remember pictures of Jesus as blue-eyed and golden haired! Likely in an African-American Sunday School he was pictured as African-American. Neither is likely to portray what a typical first century Jew looked like. Fortunately it really does not matter: the vital point is that God took human nature and was born into our world. Certainly this required being born at a particular time in history, in a particular place, inheriting the particular human genetics of his mother, and being either male or female. Also it is likely God chose each of these to suit his purposes. But those features – for instance what Jesus actually looked like - which are omitted from the Biblical record we should presume are not important.

Most times supposing God to be like us is disastrous. When we suppose that God is us writ large – that his moral character is like ours, his political views mimic our views, his concerns are a reflection of our concerns – we have simply created a god in our own image. What we then worship as God is, to the extent our image deviates from the God who actually exists, an idol.

We have verses like Isaiah 55.8 “For my thoughts are not your thoughts neither are your ways my ways declares the Lord” as examples of the error of supposing God is just like us.

Psaml 50.16ff is even more explicit:

 But to the wicked person, God says:

“What right have you to recite my laws
    or take my covenant on your lips?
17 You hate my instruction
    and cast my words behind you.
18 When you see a thief, you join with him;
    you throw in your lot with adulterers.
19 You use your mouth for evil
    and harness your tongue to deceit.
20 You sit and testify against your brother
    and slander your own mother’s son.
21 When you did these things and I kept silent,

    you thought I was exactly like you.
But I now arraign you
    and set my accusations before you.

This gives a chilling reminder that this bubble of self deception will be burst when we stand before the real God for judgement and offer us no protection.

The human tendency to fashion a comfortable (for us at any rate) god in our own image goes a long way to explaining the atrocities committed down the ages in the name of God by people who professed to be pious. In the field of government the proper reaction to this is not to say “there is no God” but rather “humans can abuse and debase anything – even the knowledge in our hearts and in scripture about God”. The remedy then is not to sweep scriptural argument from the floor of debate but to recognise human fallibility try to protect against its insidious effects.

Even if we are not “the wicked” of Psalm 50 we still see the world through coloured mental spectacles. For Democrats God is either non-existent or is a Democrat. Similarly for Republicans God surely exemplifies all that they hold dear. Thus when we reason from our existing mental and moral base we are almost bound to go wrong – all the time feeling we are being pious and secure in the belief that scripture – as read by our spectacles that block out everything that conflicts with our presuppositions – fully agrees with us.

Jeremiah encountered this problem with the theologians of his day Jeremiah 8.8 “‘How can you say, “We are wise, for we have the law of the Lord,” when actually the lying pen of the scribes has handled it falsely?” His problem extended to the entire “organised religion” - of his day when he prophesied the coming judgement on Jerusalem (Jer. 26.8) “ 8 But as soon as Jeremiah finished telling all the people everything the Lord had commanded him to say, the priests, the prophets and all the people seized him and said, “You must die! 9 Why do you prophesy in the Lord’s name that this house will be like Shiloh and this city will be desolate and deserted?”

In my lifetime I have seen a radical and thorough-going shift in protestant churches in Australia and I gather similar changes have happened in Canada and the US in Episcopal and similar denominations.

In my youth mainline protestant churches were conservative, and up to the Vietnam War patriotic and militarily hawkish. Post Vietnam they gradually became anti-war, even to the “over-realised eschatology” of believing there could be a world without wars this side of heaven. At this point I am not interested in where a biblical position lies in this matter: I am just highlighting how the mainline churches changed their spots.

In morals, churches of my youth were conservative. From the 60's “sexual revolution” on they became more and more aligned with the popular ethos. In 1988 I put a motion to the Anglican synod in my diocese condemning abortion on demand. There were such howls of indignation when I began to speak that debate had to be suspended. Two thousand years of Church belief had suddenly become as much a heresy as Jeremiah prophesying judgement on Jerusalem. Churches were notoriously silent as abortion became “normal” rather than “killing your baby”. Adultery and fornication ran rampant – bringing in their train unhappy lives and marriage breakdown with all the attendant misery harm and frequently sexual and physical abuse of children from a non-biological father. Again churches which now have so much to say about secular politics were silent watchmen.

I expect that anyone foolish enough to speak in any church synod criticising the current darlings of secular progressive socialism: anthropogenic climate change and Muslim “refugee” immigration would fare as Jeremiah did. However here I am not here arguing either policy to be good or bad: I am pointing out that churches have in a short space of time changed their core beliefs. In particular they have changed their proclamation: once it was salvation of humankind through Jesus alone; now these “new gospels” are deemed more important.

Paul wrote in Romans 12.2 “ Do not conform to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God’s will is—his good, pleasing and perfect will.

As I see it so many churches and church people have done exactly the opposite: they have conformed completely to the pattern of this world. They have then gone a step further and abandoned their first duty to proclaim the truth that is in Jesus. This is nothing new, again going back to Jeremiah: “My people have committed two sins: They have forsaken me, the spring of living water, and have dug their own cisterns, broken cisterns that cannot hold water. (Jer 2.13)

Thus in examining the nature of good government one has both to be scrupulously careful to see past one's own bias and also to realise one's best appeal will be to current non-believers, and that faithful remnant of believers who have not followed the majority into worshipping the spirit of the age.

Principles of Justice

Principles of Justice

One important role of any leader is keeping the civil peace.

For parents adjudicating in squabbles between their children is a necessary but often exasperating duty. Encouragement and punishment to instil family and societal values in our children is likewise necessary despite it being denigrated in recent times.

At the clan and tribe level the chief, shaman or elders fulfil this role and it is a necessary one in maintaining a functional social unit.

As the reach of government increases, so maintaining the rules of the society and settling disputes among members becomes more formalised. Laws need to made and promulgated so that people and judges know them. Law courts are needed for civil and criminal cases. Law enforcement becomes a whole branch of government.

In looking at the ancient world and the law codes we know about, the Biblical laws really stand apart.

The “Ten Words” giving a really concise easily memorised summary so that the ordinary person can actually know what the law is. The following text giving worked examples to show how the Commandments were to be interpreted. As Moses said “What other nation is so great as to have such righteous decrees and laws as the body of laws I am setting before you today?” (Deut,4.8) or as David wrote : “The statutes of the Lord are trustworthy, Making wise the simple. The precepts of the Lord are right, giving joy to the heart. The commands of the Lord are radiant, giving light to the eyes”

This is the big difference between the Biblical laws and the earlier law codes such as the Babylonian king Hammurabi's (c.1,745 BC) and even earlier ancient near eastern ones. They took their principles of justice (and punishments that seem draconian to us) and used them to enact laws which suited the conditions of their time and place. The Biblical with the Ten Commandments being principles aimed at the individual as much as the lawmaker – one cannot legislate against coveting; and the case examples that follow plus historical cases over the next few hundred years give principles which can be used to derive just laws for any age or stage of civilisation.

This is so important that I want to illustrate the point.

In all the sciences – from physics to medicine and beyond – one can teach the student the fundamental principles, or one can teach them just “protocols” for particular instances. Protocols are much quicker, but inflexible: basic principles are slower – the application has to be formulated – but they empower the practitioner to deal with new and unusual cases.

When I started work as an engineer, one of the notable recent failures of that design office was related to me. They were asked to design a compressed air system for starting jet engines at an airport. They were used to designing compressed air systems for normal industrial use and had the charts – protocols if you like – for such design. But normal compressed air systems only varied the air pressure about 15% from the maximum, while the new system pumped to a much higher pressure and then emptied almost entirely. When the system was built and tested it didn't work. They called in a university professor, who went back to the basic gas laws and showed them why their protocols didn't work in this case, and how to re-design the system.

So, understanding fundamental principles, like the gas laws or Newtons laws or the laws of thermodynamics allows you to deal with all circumstances whereas only learning an application of these principles to one or two situations limits you to cases that resemble those situations.

So for out modern mega-states we have a reach of government a complexity of society and ever evolving technology that the ancients could never have imagined. So if we limited ourselves to rules they had in for the cases they faced, we would be in real trouble. But if we take the time and effort to work back to the principles involved we have something really useful.

Armed with fundamental principles of justice and morals we are in a position debate how these translate into the situations we face, however novel they may be, and for those with the requisite skills to formulate this into legislation or teaching or to modify the propaganda that washes over us from TV, film books and newspapers.

Government as God's Servant

Government as God's Servant

Earlier I said that the theories of government that I came across in University started with the assumption – even if it is unspoken – that there is no God. That assumption is no more rigorous or academic that the contrary assumption, so I chose to start by assuming the Biblical revelation concerning God as a starting point.

A well known text is Romans 13: 1-6, particularly v4 “For the authority is God's servant to do you good. But if you do wrong, be afraid, for he does not bear the sword for nothing, he is God's servant, an agent of justice to bring punishment on the wrongdoer.”

Given the Genesis account of mankind's fall and the entry of sin into the world we should not be surprised that these ideals are rarely lived up to. None the less they are still the correct ideals. Not too long after these words were penned the Roman authorities were cruelly persecuting Christians. In our present day many people feel that Western governments have gone soft on brutal crimes and are not bringing “punishment on the wrongdoer”. Even this angst shows that deep down we believe that they should.

Again, criminal justice is only one aspect of government, I will show that this ideal of government - recognising that it should be a servant of God - applies to other aspects as well.

I also expect that the actual form of government may be an independent factor. Also the extent of government interference or assistance in individuals lives may be an another independent factor.

For instance ancient Israel started as a tribal league bound together by their common belief in God. Internally there must have been some tribal and clan “government”. Externally, leadership and a rallying figure for combined military action was their greatest need. Initially this was provided by a “Judge” raised up by God for that emergency. Civil law suits seem to have been heard figures like Deborah and Samuel. Then Israel asked for a king – a big mistake and an insult since it implied they did not want to rely on God appointing military leaders as required, and that they rejected their unique identity as a theocracy. However God granted their request and henceforth their government was by king, later aided by nobles and bureaucrats.

In the West we have over time developed various forms of constitutional democracy. Winston Churchill said in 1947 “Democracy is the worst form of government except for all those that have been tried from time to time”

Also both our modern 'welfare state' and the extent of government regulation and intrusion into so many parts of people's daily lives may be unprecedented in history. Whether these are good or bad is a matter of how truly that form of government is being God's servant in the prevailing conditions.

To understand how we can judge past and present government and see where governments can be improved, I want next too look at some of the Biblical case studies of good and bad government, and how they exemplify or go against the moral character of God.

Government as Servant of the People

Government as servant of the people

There are many reasons for a government to say they serve the people, or even to do so out of self interest, but an altruistic motive is harder to find.

Trying to convince people you are serving their best interests is part of the political game book. Think of the election pledges of South American semi-democracies. Each new president pledges to rid the country of corruption, better the situation of the working poor and so forth. Once in power they often become even more corrupt, rapacious and indifferent to the needs of the populace than their predecessor. Even dictators try it. Think of North Korea. With all the brutality of a police state at his disposal Kim supplements this by relentless propaganda brainwashing the population into thinking that he is looking after them and their poverty is all the fault of their arch enemy the USA.

But there are also reasons rulers to some extent may actually serve, to some extent, interests of their people. 19^th century sociologist Max Weber examined styles of rule. One, which he called “charismatic” was typified by the pirate king: he held great power - but only so long as he kept delivering the goods – if he failed then he was supplanted. Obviously it was in the interests of a charismatic leader, even one who was otherwise not inclined to do so, to keep supplying his or her followers with sufficient of what they wanted.

Another type of rule Weber identified was typified by fealty between the ruler and the ruled. Here too, the close human relationship – whether by kinship or devoted service – had a two way effect. The ruler had incentive to look after his or her people.

However historically rulers of large or small domains have been a varied lot. Some benevolent towards their subjects. Some ruthless tyrants. One of the forces which drove the development of our modern constitutional democracy – from the nobles forcing Prince John in England to sign the Magna Carta to the Pilgrims fleeing to the Americas – was to reign in bad rulers. Hence Lincoln's government “for the people” is an important statement. It is also an objective that has been seriously undermined in recent times in most Western countries. The cynical joke “whoever you vote for a politician always gets elected” is not without foundation.

In Germany, Chancellor Merkel has swamped the country with immigrants for ideological motives, to the detriment of the nation. In Australia we have recently had a scandal involving a few politicians pushing a pro China line after receiving pay-offs that were traced through local businessmen back to Chinese government entities. I expect that in every country there are problems with corruption on large or small scales.

All of these – ideology, self interest, pay-backs for political support, influence of powerful lobby groups and bribery – mean that governments are not putting the welfare of their people first.

However I was surprised when I tried to find Biblical reaching promoting “government as servant of the people”. It was not there as an end in itself. Make no mistake, the Bible had many damning things to say about rulers who looked after themselves not the people! It was just that it was the end result of other things. God-fearing rulers loved justice because God loves justice – so they made sure the law-courts ran properly and treated everyone impartially. God-fearing rulers saw that God had put them in charge of his people, so they owed it to God to govern for the people not themselves. And so the list goes on.

A minister once quoted to me “I am every man's servant: yet I have but one Master”. I think this will turn out to be the case with truly good government as well. It is the result of duty to God.

So I want to pause the examination of “servant of the people” in order to deal with the Biblical view of who governments are ultimately responsible to, what their responsibilities are and the precepts which, if followed by rulers – be they kings or elected bodies – inevitably produce a government which truly serves the people.

Starting Hypothesis on Good Government

Starting Hypothesis on Good Government.

Science starts with a hypothesis and looks for evidence that will prove, disprove or improve it.

So in coming to the Bible for a theory of good government, I want to put forward a starting hypothesis. I am also making an assumption: namely that the actual essence or qualities of good government can be set out independently of the type of government – king, president or parliament. Democratically elected or hereditary. Although of course some types of government may be much more likely to be good than others.

My starting hypothesis is this:

1. The government is there to serve the people, not the other way round. Just a general Biblical knowledge throws up texts like Ezekiel 32:4 “woe to you shepherds of Israel who only take care of yourselves, should not shepherds take care of the flock?” Indeed the common Biblical metaphor of “shepherds” to denote the national leaders – or government even by itself raises a notion of duty of care. Coming forward to the New Testament we have the familiar words of Jesus referring to himself as the Good Shepherd and saying in John 10 :11 “I am the good shepherd. The good shepherd lays down his life for his sheep”. And as an example of God's character and actions as the supreme ruler of all, Jesus' words in Mark 10:45 “for even the Son of Man did not come to be served but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many”. So Jesus has set a very high standard for human rulers to aim for.

2. Any ruler or government is governing people who belong to God not to them, and have a fiduciary duty to God for how they govern. I am thinking of the many texts like 2 Samuel 7:8 “I … appointed you ruler over my people Israel” and Romans 13:1 “There is no authority except that which God has established”

Historically these have seldom been followed. Even in “Christian” England the doctrine was of the divine right of kings, rather then the divine duty of kings.

3. Enacting just laws, law enforcement and maintaining justice in the criminal and civil courts is a vital role of government. Again we will be looking for more detail, but verses like Isaiah 61:8 “I the Lord love justice, I hate robbery and wrongdoing.” and even the Queen of Sheeba's observation to Solomon in 1 Kings 10:9 “(The Lord) has made you king to maintain justice and righteousness”.

4. Sound foreign policy and defence against external threat. I am including this in the hypothesis based on God's actions in raising up national military leaders as needed during the period of the “Judges”, the inspired actions of kings like David and Saul, and the advice given by prophets on these subjects although this was often rejected by the king of the time to their ruin. Think of Jeremiah's advice to Zedekiah not to rebel against his Babylonian overlord, and after he did so, to surrender and thus save both his life and the city. (Zedekiah rejected this advice and lost his life and the city was sacked). How this applies in modern times may be a more difficult question.

5. Maintain true religion. It will be interesting to consider how this is even possible in modern “secular” states, and a multi-religion society. Certainly past history in Western nations where either Protestants or Roman Catholics or Baptists, Quakers and other “dissenters” were persecuted is not something we should want to see again. However I want to leave it in our hypothesis for the present for two reasons: a) maybe governments always maintain a religion. At present many government agencies are subtly or not so subtly persecuting people with traditional Christian beliefs, because the popular religion of the ruling elites is an anti-Christian progressive socialism. b) In Old Testament times the moral or religious stance of the king – or sometimes a high priest or a prophet did effect the entire nation.

Naturally, we may find other necessary attributes of good government as we delve further.

Towards a Theory of Government

Towards a Theory of Government

First an apology to regular readers. I was a silly boy and kept on working out of doors after I got the 'flue (it is winter here) and as my wife predicted I caught pneumonia! That is why there have been no posts for the last few weeks.)

“It's already been done!” you may say. Well, yes and no. It is a quarter of a century since I studied this topic during a sabbatical year back at university so I can't recall all the names, but I recall the drift of it well enough. From Rousseau with his social contract, Locke and Hobbes, through Marx and Lenin to all the modern social theorists there has been no lack of ink spilt. But, and this is the big catch, so far as I know they all start from either a blank page and try to build a theory from scratch or like Marx are defiantly atheistic and try to build a human based theory.

So a vital route to developing a theory of what constitutes “good government” has been neglected. That is: if we assume God exists and the Bible is the best source of information about is character and purposes and of human frailties.

Now I know many will protest vigorously: “You can't do that!!! You MUST start from the assumption that there is no God, otherwise you are biased.” Well excuse me, but why is that any more biased that taking their assumption!

As I said way back in discussing the foundation for ethical theory Where Do Morals Come From ? Pt. 2  there is a real problem for atheistic moralists: what makes them right? If you are basing your morals on the moral character of God (I dealt with the question “which God” back then) you at least have some solid ground from which to argue your case, otherwise you are just building castles in the air. Worse still it becomes a case that the person or group with the most power – whether by propaganda or brute force or both – gets to decide “this is good, that is bad, behaviour”. Might becomes Right.

So I think our best route to finding out what a government should aspire to be like is to take the road less (if ever) travelled and look for clues in the Bible.

I think we will likely find three types of information:

1. How God as “King” acts.

2. Direct statements of praise or condemnation of actions of human rulers

3. Stories that show governors in a good or bad light.

From these I hope we can construct an image of what a good government looks like

The Problem of Government

The Problem of Government

As I see it, we have had a moment of good government and it is ending.

Government for the people has not been the historical norm! Far from it. Rulers have generally oppressed their people. Recently we visited China, and like good tourists went to see the Terracotta Warriors. We there read the various blurbs about the early emperors. They were a uniformly nasty lot. Their only interest seemed to be themselves, they brutally used their people and had not a thought for the welfare of those they ruled. In other times and places there were some better rulers, but they were the exception. Sadly in Europe we heard about barons and even bishops who built forts along the rivers that were the only practical trade routes and exacted heavy tolls from traders. Surprisingly it was in Turkey that we saw a caravansary built by the Moslem ruler on a trade route where anyone could come for three nights free lodging within its walls under the ruler's protection and with the guarantee of leaving with whatever goods they had arrived with.

Government by the people has most certainly not been the historical norm! But we have grown to like the idea.

In the West both these ideals are developing stress fractures as I pointed out in earlier posts. In Europe unelected EU bureaucrats are increasingly making decisions. In America political elites in both parties call the shots, but live in a rarefied atmosphere far from the cares and woes of a large section of the population. Hence the phenomenon of Donald Trump. In Australia I'm probably too close to the situation to see clearly, but it looks as though politicians are chasing votes rather than making the unpalatable choices that are necessary to get the country out of debt.

But all around the West it is not just the politicians but the people who are acting badly.

There is this phenomenon if identity politics. People who “identify as …” (homosexual, Aboriginal, African American, and the list seems ever expanding) are demanding that no one is allowed to offend them, and tyrannising over the majority. The homosexual lobby “LGBT” or whatever is the latest acronym is one example. Homosexual acts used to be illegal, they were decriminalized – fair enough, but the lobby did not stop there, anti-discrimination legislation came in to make it unlawful to discriminate against such people, or even ask about sexuality for employment. Then it went further, no one was allowed to offend homosexuals, so anyone who even hinted that such acts were anything other than the norm were pilloried as “homophobes”. And so on.

Then there is the lynch mob mentality of social and mainstream media. Fair trial? Not likely! With no opportunity make their defence, with no check on the accuracy of the allegations, indeed with none of the essentials of determining the truth of the matter, issues are decided by stories going viral on the internet, or being “exposed” by TV news shows chasing ratings, and often the “crime” was merely to offend against identity politics or political correctness. This takes us back to the burning of witches and recurrent pogroms of a past we would like to leave in the past.

There is self interest overruling all else. In a sensible family, if they have maxed out their credit cards through spending more than they earn, they don't go on spending as usual – they work out what economies they need to make get out of debt. That is common sense. But many of our countries are deep in debt and getting deeper. That can't go on forever. Yet in Greece for instance the populace threw out a government that wanted “austerity measures” that would not even reduce government spending on welfare and other programs – just reduce how fast it was increasing!

As Margaret Thatcher once said: “The trouble with socialists is that they eventually run out of other people's money to spend.” No country can go on consuming more than it produces.

In all the above I am not saying anything novel. In recent times more and more columnists have been saying these things in greater detail and more eloquently than I have.

My point in joining the chorus is to highlight that in order to save the West, attitudes of both politicians and voters need to change. Next I want to look at what makes for good government to see what these attitudes need to change to.