The Wages of the Laborers

“Well, fi’ cents a box ain’t much, but a fella can eat.”

 “Fi’ cents?” the wizened man cried. “Fi’ cents! They payin’ you fi’ cents?”

 “Sure. We made a buck an’ a half.”

 A heavy silence fell in the tent. Casey stared out the entrance, into the dark night. “Lookie, Tom,” he said at last. “We come to work there. They says it’s gonna be fi’ cents. They was a hell of a lot of us. We got there an’ they says they’re payin’ two an’ a half cents. A fella can’t even eat on that, an’ if he got kids – So we says we won’t take it. So they druv us off. An’ all the cops in the worl’ come down on us. Now they’re payin’ you five. When they bust this here strike – ya think they’ll pay five?”

 “I dunno,” Tom said. “Payin’ five now.” (Steinbeck 522)

In a capitalist system employers seek to pay employees as little as possible so as to keep as much profit as possible. They would, if were not against the law, pay less than the minimum wage; they’d eliminate the minimum wage and let competition among workers drive wages down as far as possible – after all, there’s always someone desperate enough to work, even for less, even for less than he can live on.

“Try an’ tell ‘em, Tom. They’ll get two an’ a half, jus’ the minute were gone. You know what two an’ a half is-that’s one ton of peaches picked and carried for a dollar.” He dropped his head. “No – you can’t do it. You can’t get your food for that. Can’t eat for that.” (523)

But is it ethical? Is it moral? Is it Just? To value profit over people, to pay less than a livable wage?

Come now, you rich, weep and howl for the miseries that are coming upon you. Your riches have rotted and your garments are moth-eaten. Your gold and silver have rusted, and their rust will be evidence against you and will eat your flesh like fire. You have laid up treasure for the last days. Behold, the wages of the laborers who mowed your fields, which you kept back by fraud, cry out; and the cries of the harvesters have reached the ears of the Lord of hosts. You have lived on the earth in luxury and in pleasure; you have fattened your hearts in a day of slaughter. You have condemned, you have killed the righteous man; he does not resist you. (James 5: 1 – 6 RSV)

Steinbeck, John. The Grapes of Wrath. New York, NY: Penguin Books. 1939. Print.

Objecting to Objectionable Elements

I don’t recall how it came to be in my little library, but I have a copy of the little pamphlet Objectionable Elements: The Biblical Approach published by Bob Jones University Press. It is a brief guide for Christian educators and administrators[i] to handling “objectionable elements” in the classrooms of Christian schools. It’s an amusing little booklet, but not very helpful.

The booklet begins with an explanation that censorship isn’t just an issue for “religious conservatives” but that “[s]ecularist educators” do it as well (Horton 1), that is, all educators are purposefully selective in what they choose to use in their classes. They will select material that furthers their educational goals and not use material that is counter to their purposes. “Censorship, therefore, whether in Christian or secular schools, is inescapable” (1).

But already we’ve gone slightly off target. This isn’t censorship. This is not the suppression or deletion of material considered offensive, immoral, harmful or objectionable. This kind of careful and deliberate selection of material is not the banning or burning of “bad books.” This is selection, not censorship. (Asheim)

But we’ll let that bit of semantics slide.

The author then lists a number of common categories of “censorable,” objectionable elements: 1) Profanity, 2) Scatological realism, 3) Erotic realism, 4) Sexual perversion, 5) Lurid violence, 6) Occultism, and 7) Erroneous religious or philosophical assumptions. (3) The conscientious Christian educator[ii] will have to deal in some way with this kind of material in the classroom.

According to the pamphlet there are four ways to handle this material: the Permissive, the Exclusive, the Pragmatic and the Biblical.

The Permissive approach is characterized by the author as that of “intellectuals” and is weak and subjective. It “arrogantly elevates human wisdom above divine” (5) in allowing objectionable elements. The author gets a wee bit catty in calling out the magazine Christianity Today and Intervarsity Press as examples of this approach. (4)

On the other end of the spectrum is the Exclusive approach, which would exclude any and all objectionable elements. “This is the view held by conscientious pastors, Christian educators, and laymen concerned for the moral preservation of their children…” (5). But, while the sympathies and spiritual affinities of Bob Jones University might be with these good folks (5) this approach goes too far. If followed, it would eliminate Shakespeare, Melville, Twain, Frost...even John Bunyan and the Bible itself.  To the author’s credit, he does admit that examples of each of these “objectionable elements” can be found “in certain ways and to certain degrees in the Bible” (6) [iii] and we routinely and without a second thought give copies of the Bible to children and encourage them to read the scriptures-scriptures filled with lurid violence, scatological references, and explicit sexuality.

Trying to find some middle ground between the extremes of the Permissive and the Exclusive is the Pragmatic approach, in which “[e]ach person must decide for himself[iv] how much evil is too much to be tolerable in a literary work or in material used in teaching.” This might seem like a pretty good way to go – but the author describes this as “theologically the weakest” of all the approaches in that it “implies that it is impossible to order our lives according to the will of a holy God” (10).  I’m not sure why it implies such a thing. I’m not convinced that it does, but we’ll come back to that.

Fortunately, and to our great relief, the author tells us that there is another approach, a Biblical approach that will help us to deal with objectionable elements without being too permissive or too exclusive or having to use our own best judgement.

The Biblical approach, according to the author, will determine what to use and what to exclude based on three criteria:

1) The criterion of gratuitousness – does the representation of evil serve a purpose in the work or is it evil for evil’s sake?  2) The criterion of explicitness – is the representation of evil present in “an acceptable degree”? And 3) The criterion of moral tone – is the evil presented sufficiently condemned? (12 - 13)

These criteria are presented as objective evaluative standards which can be used by any God-fearing-bible-believing Christian. “The basis of a truly Biblical position concerning censorable elements is the following distinction. If a work of literature or other element of curriculum treats evil in the same way that it is treated in the Scriptures, we regard it as not only acceptable but also desirable reading, listening, or viewing for someone of sufficient maturity as to benefit from comparable portions of the Scriptures” (12). “For instance, whereas a conscientious Christian teacher might assign a Willa Cather novel[v] to a Christian high-school class, he[vi] would not assign John Steinbeck’s Grapes of Wrath” (18).

But this is subterfuge. For all its appearance as an objective and standardized and Biblical approach, it really is no different from the Pragmatic approach described earlier. It comes down to interpretation and evaluation. And I certainly would assign The Grapes of Wrath, both for its excellence as work of literature and for its powerful expression of Christian values.

It comes down to interpretation and evaluation. Unless one wants to go all the way to the Exclusive approach where all objectionable elements are refused, (in which case we’re tossing out the Bible), then we all have to be Pragmatists in our approach. (The Permissive approach as described by the author is really just this as well. He just doesn’t like it.) We all of us have to ask, how much are we comfortable with? Does it align with our understanding of Scripture? If not can it still illuminate Christian truth? Am I competent enough to teach this material? And, is my audience mature enough to handle the material?

If we’re going to object to all objectionable material, if we’re going to avoid material in books or films that might be in any way controversial, we might as well just shut down, because we’ve already shut down our brains.

Asheim, Lester. "Not Censorship but Selection." Editorial. Wilson Library Bulletin Sept. 1953: 63-67. American Library Association, Nov. 2005. Web. 23 Mar. 2016.

Horton, Ronald A. Objectionable Elements: The Biblical Approach. Greenville, SC: Bob Jones University Press, 1990. Print.

---

[i] I should say, “male” Christian educators and administrators: the pronouns are exclusively masculine. “The Christian teacher, led by the same Spirit that inspired God’s Holy Word, will scrutinize prayerfully his methods and materials to ensure that they likewise are free of that which hinders and diverts from his purpose: the conforming of his students to the image of God in Christ. He will censor for the sake of his students and, in the case of materials he uses, ascertain whether the necessary censorship has been done by the authors or may otherwise be done by himself” (Horton 2 -3).Emphasis added.

[ii] Ehem.. the conscientious MALE Christian educator…

[iii] If they didn’t my whole series of Biblical Limericks wouldn’t be possible.

[iv] Ehem…himself…

[v] Would Bob Jones University really be comfortable assigning the work Willa Cather, a woman who went about dressed as a man and called herself “William” and who may have been a lesbian?  

[vi] Ehem…he…

Socialism Is Love

I often tell people that if I am a socialist (and I do think of myself that way) it’s not because of Karl Marx. I have read Marx – a little – but, good grief, he’s sooooooo dull. No. I’m only a Marxist if you mean Groucho, Harpo, and Chico. I tell people that I learned my socialism from Jesus, the Hebrew prophets, General William Booth (founder of the Salvation Army) and the novels of John Steinbeck – and I’m only about 20% joking.

Last night, a friend of mine tried to correct me. “You didn’t learn socialism from Jesus – because that’s not what he teaches. You learned how to love others from him.”

To which I said, “It’s the same thing.”

As I have come to understand it socialism is (or can be) a political expression of those biblical instructions to care for the poor, the outcast, the marginalized. Socialism is (or can be) a political expression of that biblical injunction to love my neighbor as myself. Socialism is love.

Steinbeck and the Most Important Word in the World

Have I mentioned that I love Steinbeck?  Of course I have; John Steinbeck is the best. Take for example, this discussion of Cain and the most important word in the world, from his novel East of Eden:

                “Do you remember when you read us the sixteen verses of the fourth chapter of Genesis and we argued about them?”
                “I do indeed.  And that’s a long time ago.”
                “Ten years nearly,” said Lee.  “Well, the story bid deeply into me and I went into it word for word.  The more I thought about the story, the more profound it became to me.  Then I compared the translations that we have-and they were fairly close.  There was only one place that bothered me.  The King James version says this-it is when Jehovah has asked Cain why he is angry.  Jehovah says, ‘If thou doest well, shalt thou not be accepted? And if thou doest not well, sin lieth at the door. And unto thee shall be his desire, and thou shalt rule over him.’ It was the ‘thou shalt’ that struck me, because it was a promise that Cain would conquer sin.”
                Samuel nodded.  “And his children didn’t do it entirely,” he said.
                Lee sipped his coffee.  “Then I got a copy of the American Standard Bible.  It was very new then.  And it was different in this passage.  It says, ‘Do thou rule over him.’ Now this is very different This is not a promise, it is an order.  … The American Standard translation orders men to triumph over sin, and you can call sin ignorance.  The King James translation makes it a promise in ‘Thou shalt,’ meaning that men will surely triumph over sin.  But the Hebrew word, the word timshel-‘Thou mayest’-that gives a choice.  It might be the most important word in the world.  That says the way is open.  That throws it right back on a man.  For if ‘Thou mayest’-it is also true that ‘Thou mayest not.’ Don’t you see?”
                “Yes, I see.  I do see.  But you do not believe this is divine law.  Why do you feel its importance?”
                “Ah!” said Lee. “I’ve wanted to tell you this for a long time.  I even anticipated your questions and I am well prepared. Any writing which has influenced the thinking and the lives of innumerable people is important.  Now, there are millions in their sects and churches who feel the order, ‘Do thou,’ and throw their weight into obedience.  And there are millions more who feel predestination in ‘Thou shalt.’  Nothing they may do can interfere with what will be.  But ‘Thou mayest’!  Why that makes a man great, that gives him stature with the gods, for in his weakness and his filth and his murder of brother he has still the great choice.  He can choose his course and fight it through and win.”  Lee’s voice was a chant of triumph.  

The Most Contentious Man This World Has Ever Seen

I have been re-reading one of my favorite books, East of Eden by John Steinbeck.  I love Steinbeck. 

In this passage Samuel Hamilton is preparing to visit his friend and neighbor, Adam Trask, in order to help bring him out of a year-long funk.  Adam’s wife, Cathy, had shot him and abandoned him and their newly born twin sons.  Samuel is charged by his wife with making sure that those boys have names. 

***

In the midst of painting the blacking on his worn shoes he looked sideways up at her. “Could I take the Bible along?” he asked.  “There’s no place for getting a good name like the Bible.”

“I don’t much like it out of the house,” she said uneasily.  “And if you’re late coming home, what’ll I have for my reading?  And the children’s names are in it.” She saw his face fall.  She went into the bedroom and came back with a small Bible, worn and scuffed, its cover held on by brown paper and glue. “Take this one,” she said.

“But that’s your mother’s.”

“She wouldn’t mind.  And all the names but one in here have two dates.”

“I’ll wrap it so it won’t get hurt,” said Samuel.

Liza spoke sharply, “What my mother would mind is what I mind, and I’ll tell you what I mind. You’re never satisfied to let the Testament alone.  You’re forever picking at it and questioning it. You turn it over the way a ‘coon turns over a wet rock, and it angers me.”

“I’m just trying to understand it, Mother.”

“What’s there to understand? Just read it.  There it is in black and white.  Who wants you to understand it?  If the Lord God want you to understand it He’d have given you to understand or He’d have set it down different.”

“But, Mother-“

“Samuel,” she said, “you’re the most contentious man this world has ever seen.”

“Yes, Mother.”

“Don’t agree with me all the time. It hints of insincerity. Speak up for yourself.”

“She looked after his dark figure in the buggy as he drove away.  “He’s a sweet husband,” she said aloud, “but contentious.”

And Samuel was thinking with wonder, Just when I think I know her she does a thing like that.

***

I recognize something of Samuel in myself-though I never refer to my wife as “mother.”  That’s just weird.

The Grapes of Wrath – Movie Night Discussion Guide

Every so often we have a "movie night" with our congregation - not just to watch a movie and be entertained, but to discuss and to learn something from a great film.  Tonight we're going to be watching John Ford's The Grapes of Wrath based on John Steinbeck's novel.  It's a film I've used in previous appointments.  What follows is a the brief discussion guide I printed up for the group a few years back.

The Grapes of Wrath – Movie Night Discussion Guide

In the mid to late 1930s a series of Dustbowls – dust storms that darkened the skies across nearly the entire nation – devastated the Great Plains of the United States and Canada.  Powerful winds, picking up dirt and dust from the ground made the sky appear black all the way to Chicago.  Eventually the soil was completely lost as it was blown out to the Atlantic Ocean.  Topsoil across millions of acres was blown away because of the indigenous sod had been broken for wheat farming and the vast herds of bison that once fertilized that sod were gone, nearly exterminated.

With their crops ruined, lands barren and dry, and homes foreclosed for unpayable debts, many farm families gave up and left.  They left homes and farms that had been part of their families for generations to look for a better life elsewhere.  Many of the displaced were from the state of Oklahoma, where 15% of the state’s population left.  The migrants were often called Okies whether they were from Oklahoma or not.

This is the setting of John Steinbeck’s powerful novel, and the equally gripping 1940 movie version directed by John Ford, the mass migration of people for the “Promised Land” of California and the promise of good jobs with decent pay.  But that promise would remain unfulfilled.  In California the Okies found, not the sweet nectar of grapes running down their chins, but the “Grapes of Wrath.”

In 1937 California passed the so-called “Anti-Okie Law” which stated: Every person, firm, or corporation, or officer or agent thereof that brings or assists in bringing into the State any indigent person who is not a resident of the State, knowing him to be an indigent person, is guilty of a misdemeanor.”  The statute was eventually overturned in 1941.

The title of the novel and subsequent film – suggested to Steinbeck by his first wife – was drawn from “The Battle Hymn of the Republic” He is trampling out the vintage where the grapes of wrath are stored…  Steinbeck said that when he wrote The Grapes of Wrath he was “filled…with certain angers… at people who were doing injustices to other people.”  The writing of the book was his response to the injustice he saw committed against the poor and helpless.

Proverbs: 14: 31 – If you oppress poor people, you insult the God who made them, but kindness shown to the poor is an act of worship.
Proverbs 21: 13 – If you refuse to listen to the cry of the poor, your own cry for help will not be heard.
Proverbs 22:9 – Be generous and share your food with the poor. You will be blessed for it.

… if a fella’s got sompin to eat an’ another fella’s hungry – why the first fella aint got no choice. (Grapes, 66)

The movie ends on a much more positive note than the novel – with Ma’s declaration that she won’t be scared any longer, and that “we’ll go on forever, Pa, because we’re the people.”  The family is safe – at least temporarily – in the government camp and in the promise of “twenty days work.”  The novel, however, is not quite that upbeat.  It’s not hopeless, but the hope is a deeply troubled hope, a hope that has hurt, continues to hurt, but goes on despite.  Their hope is built in community, in unity with “our own people,” people working together.

The shocking conclusion of the book – omitted from the movie – was considered scandalous and prurient by many, and led to the book being banned from many libraries.  Rose of Sharon’s baby is stillborn, the family is forced to move out of the security of the camp, and Tom has left the family. But they continue, doggedly struggling to work and to live.  The Joads, who don’t have much themselves, continue to share what little they have, Rose of Sharon going so far as to feed a starving old man her own breast milk.

Steinbeck wrote, “I am not trying to write a satisfying story.  I have done my damndest to rip a reader’s nerves to rags. I don’t want him satisfied.”  Indeed, the book left many people unsatisfied.  They reacted with a fierce hostility to the book, calling it “a lie, a black infernal creation of the Marxist, Soviet propaganda.” Ministers, republicans, bankers, senators and librarians denounced it as communist, immoral, degrading, warped and untruthful.

It’s a powerful work of anger, but not a hateful, destructive anger.  Steinbeck’s anger, and Ford’s, was directed against injustice and oppression.  In this way, their anger is a motivating energy, driving us to learn from each other, and to stand with each other to create a better world for the whole community. 

Questions and Reflections

What is more important – ownership and possession or work and labor?

How does Jim Casey, the former preacher, embody a “Christ figure”?

“They payin’ you 5¢?”  “Come now, you rich people, weep and wail for your miseries that are coming to you… Listen!  The wages of laborers who mowed your fields, which you kept back by fraud, cry out, and the cries of the harvesters have reached the Lord of hosts.” – James 5: 1 – 6

How is a fair wage determined? 

Socialists and Reds have a bad reputation in the mouths of rich and powerful characters in the movie.  They are “agitators” and “troublemakers.”  Why are they so despised?  Who is working to help the poor and downtrodden in the movie?

“Cursed be anyone who deprives the alien, the orphan, and the widow of justice.  And all the people shall say, Amen!”  - Deuteronomy 27: 19 What does the movie have to say about this verse?

The service station attendants say that the Joadas, and all the Okies like them, “…got no sense and no feeling; they aint human.  A human being wouldn’t live like they do.  A human being couldn’t stand to be so dirty and miserable.  They aint a hell of a lot better than gorillas.”  (Grapes, 301)  What should our attitude be towards those who are less fortunate?

The book and the movie are both structured on the progression from the “I” to the “We”, from a struggle of the individual to the struggle of the group.  What does the Christian faith have to say about the struggle of the community?  How does that play against the American value on “rugged individualism”? 

The following quote is often attributed to Karl Marx:  “The rich will do anything for the poor, but get off their backs.”  Is that an accurate statement?

“Then I looked again at the injustice that goes on this world.  The oppressed were crying, and no one would help them.  No one would help them because their oppressors had power on their side.”  Ecclesiastes 4:1   As the woman who was accidentally shot in the “Hooverville” lies bleeding to death, one of the deputies rather callously says, “what a mess those .45s make”  How is power and wealth used against the poor?  Who makes the law?  Who enforces it?

“I’ll be all around in the dark. I’ll be everywhere; wherever you can look, wherever there’s a fight so hungry people can eat, I’ll be there.  Wherever there’s a cop beatin’ up on a guy, I’ll be there.  I’ll be in the way guys yell when they’re mad.  I’ll be in the way kids laugh when they’re hungry and they know supper’s ready.  And when people are eatin’ the food they raised and livin’ in the houses they built, I’ll be there too.” – Tom Joad

“While women weep, as they do now, I’ll fight.  While children go hungry, as they do now, I’ll fight.  While men go to prison, in and out, in and out, as they do now, I’ll fight.  While there is a drunkard left, while there is a poor lost girl upon the street, while there remains one dark soul without the light of God, I’ll fight!  I’ll fight to the very end!”  - General William Booth of The Salvation Army


Sources
Ebert, Roger The Great Movies II, Broadway Books; New York, NY 2005.
Steinbeck, John The Grapes of Wrath, Penguin Books, New York, NY, 1939.
Steinbeck, John, ed Robert Demott, Working Days: The Journals of The Grapes of Wrath, Penguin Books, New York, NY, 1989.

Challenging Limericks and Fair Wages

A limerick that I posted the other day  was challenged on Twitter by my friend, Thom.

@thatjeffcarter from where do you get your concept of a "Just" or "Fair" wage? Fair wage=wage you & your boss agree to, right? Matt 20:2-15
— Thom Moffitt (@thmoffitt) September 24, 2013

To which I responded:

1) Agreement doesn't necessarily mean "just" or "fair."  If I convince someone to do backbreaking labor for me for $1 dollar a day - that doesn't make it right.  If I take advantage of people's ignorance or desperation in order to pay them as little as possible, I am not paying a fair or just wage - even if they agree to accept it.

This give me opportunity to quote from one of my favorite books - The Grapes of Wrath

Pa and Uncle John squatted with a group of men by the porch of the office. "We nearly go work today," Pa said.  "We was jus' a few minutes late.  They awready got two fellas.  An', well, sir, it was a funny thing.  They's a straw boss there, an' he says, 'We jus' got some two-bit men. 'Course we could use twenty-cent men.  We can use a lot a twenty-cent men.  You go to your camp an' say we'll put a lot a fells on for twenty cents.'"

The squatting men moved nervously.  A broad-shouldered man, his face completely in the shadow of a black hat, spatted his knee with his palm, "I know it, goddamn it!" he cried. "An' they'll git men.  They'll git hungry men.  You can't feed your family on twenty cents an hour, but you'll take anything.  They got you goin' an' comin'.  They jes' auction a job off.  Jesus Christ, pretty soon they're gonna make us pay to work."

John Steinbeck - The Grapes of Wrath - page 461-2

2)The parable cited from Matthew 20: 2- 15 is not really about fair wages.  It uses a discussion about wages in order to talk about something else, namely the Kingdom of God.  Nevertheless - that story is about being MORE generous, not less.  To use this parable as justification for paying people less runs counter to the story itself.




(of course these responses here are a bit expanded.  My twitter responses were necessarily constrained by the 140 character limit...)

The Human Faces of God – Before and After

Before reading Thom Stark’s Human Faces of God I accepted that I was probably not a believer in the inerrancy of the bible.  I was willing to admit that there were mistakes in scientific issues, historical accounts but I was still convinced of the infallibility of the bible in theological and moral and ethical matters.

I probably would have described myself as a “neo-orthodox” in regards to my opinion on the authority and inspiration of the scriptures.

Before reading Human Faces I read the bible with a somewhat confrontational attitude. I read the stories and the letters and lists with the idea that the best way to understand them was to pull them apart, to examine the pieces, to break them open and to see what was hiding inside – because I believed that in the end it would be possible to put them back together again and that once reassembled, the texts would retain their divinely inspired Truth (even if some of the details were found to be in error).

But there too, I was standing at the edge of a precipice.

I would sometimes tell people that I could understand Martin Luther’s impulse to excise certain books from the cannon, and that if I had supreme executive power (derived from a mandate from the masses and not from some farcical aquatic ceremony) I would remove the book of Nahum from the bible.  It seemed to me that Nahum was like a fire burning green and wet wood - producing more smoke than light and obscuring more than he revealed of God.

I kept my scissors put away, however. I was being facetious (mostly). 

It’s funny.  I argued with the scripture. Asked questions that it couldn’t or wouldn’t answer.  I wrestled with it and refused to give up, even after it broke my hip and left me hobbling toward home. But when I started reading Thom Stark’s book, I found myself defending that same book against his arguments which, to be honest, were sometimes my own arguments.  (Perhaps I was arguing with him because I was afraid to be convinced by his answers. Perhaps…)

Stark’s conclusion is that the Scriptures of the Old and New Testaments, while being inspired, suffer “from scientific and historical problems, but also – and much more significantly – from moral, ethical, theological, and ideological problems. (pg. 208)”

The first part of that conclusion seems obvious to me now.  Sometimes I wonder how I could have missed it or how I could have ignored it.  It’s the second part of his conclusion – that there are theological and moral problems in the bible – that has me standing nervously at the edge of that precipice again.

The Bible is a mirror. Stark argues that when we read the scriptures what we see isn’t God, but rather ourselves. And if we’re reading carefully and confrontationally we’ll see the good parts of ourselves and also the ugly and depraved parts of ourselves that we’d just as soon hide from view.

I can accept this.  But it seems to me that this can be true of any text.

Reading John Steinbeck’s explosive novel, The Grapes of Wrath, rocked me to my core and challenged me to be more than I was before.  It still does.  A People’s History of the United States by the historian Howard Zinn forced me to confront history as more than a recitation of dates and events – forced me to see the morals and motivations that underlie the histories we tell (and the stories that we don’t tell).  It was, in part, the lyrics (another kind of text) of U2’s Joshua Tree that began me thinking about what it means to pursue social justice in our world.  

These texts then showed me the good and the bad in myself and in the world around me.  These texts – though not divinely inspired and clearly not inerrant– showed me new and better ways to be.  Is there a difference between the writings of Steinbeck and the writings of Amos? Is there a difference between Zinn’s history and the history recorded by the Chronicler of the bible? Is there a difference between Bono and the Psalmist? 

I hate reducing the argument to such a trivial expression – but I am still wondering: Are the scriptures of the Old and New Testaments words from God (if somewhat corrupted and distorted by human error) or are they merely words about God?

I recognize that I can’t hold a belief in the inerrancy of these words. I’m still wrestling (broken hip and all) with it, trying to learn from it all.

But a recent post concerning the “Insufficiency of Scripture” at the blog – Exploring Our Matrix -  gave me some comfort with these words from 2 John 12:

I have much to write to you, but I do not want to use paper and ink. Instead, I hope to visit you and talk with you face to face, so that our joy may be complete.

“For those of us who are at times tempted to focus too much attention on the Bible, or to believe that it contains all the answers and solutions to all problems, this verse is a helpful reminder that an author of a letter that is now part of Scripture thought some things were better said face to face – that there were things that could not be accomplished as well or as effectively or simply as joyfully through written words as through personal interaction.”  - James McGrath

When I struggle to understand, or when I struggle to accept, the ugly parts of the scriptures, I trust that it is the relationship that I have with God that will carry me through – even when I doubt and disbelieve. 

I'm glad that I've read Stark's book.  It's challenged me.  It's pushed me.  It is pushing me.This is an issue that I'll continue to consider.


To see my other comments and questions - and the author, Thom Stark's, response (!!) read here.