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Speaker 1: Hey, everyone. Welcome back to Thinking Christian. I'm Dr. James Spencer.

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Speaker 1: I'm joined by my co-host, Ashish Pharma.

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Speaker 2: And today we're going to do a follow up to

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Speaker 2: our capital punishment episode and address some of the remarks

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Speaker 2: that Ashish made toward the end, which I think are

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Speaker 2: really interesting. And I said I had a couple of challenges,

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Speaker 2: but I mean, for the most part, I think that

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Speaker 2: what you're articulating, I resonate with. So you'd make actually

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Speaker 2: a comment, I can't remember which episode we did at

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Speaker 2: this point, but you talked about the long suffering of

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Speaker 2: God being sort of the normative pattern of the way

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Speaker 2: that God interacts with the world. And I think that's true.

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Speaker 2: I think that there's a real sense in which that happens.

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Speaker 2: And so I'm interested to explore this. We're probably going

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Speaker 2: to get into the intersection of judgment and mercy is

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Speaker 2: where I'm guessing we're going to end up here and

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Speaker 2: how that ends up. interacting in itself. So maybe we

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Speaker 2: start out with just, if you could summarize just a

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Speaker 2: little bit of what you talked about toward the end,

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Speaker 2: you kind of went.

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Speaker 1: Through Hosea a bit and did a couple other maneuvers.

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Speaker 2: And so I'd like to give listeners who didn't, weren't

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Speaker 2: listening then the opportunity to hear what you had to

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Speaker 2: say now.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, that's fair. That probably means starting with a little

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Speaker 3: bit of summary of what I understood you to be saying.

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Speaker 3: So yeah, I think one of the seminal frameworks or

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Speaker 3: ways in which you are framing your understanding of the

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Speaker 3: difference between our context and the Old Testament context with

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Speaker 3: regard to capital punishment is to pay attention to the

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Speaker 3: deep meaning that's at play when we think about covenant relationship.

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Speaker 3: We are not in a covenant relationship with God. We

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Speaker 3: exist as a modern nation state that's grounded in other

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Speaker 3: sort of ways, but most centrally, by a series of

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Speaker 3: documents that sort of lay out what it means to

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Speaker 3: be an American and what that then entails of responsibility

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Speaker 3: between governmental practices and citizenship, right? And it also sets

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Speaker 3: up boundaries in a certain way. Those boundaries eventually get expanded,

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Speaker 3: but there's still boundaries as to whom this applies to

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Speaker 3: and who this doesn't apply to, how we allow people

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Speaker 3: to be part of it versus what doesn't count as

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Speaker 3: being a part of it. As opposed to biblical Israel,

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Speaker 3: where it's a direct relationship with God, and this is

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Speaker 3: the expectation, these series of expectations of what it means

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Speaker 3: to be in covenant relationship with God, and that creates

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Speaker 3: certain entailments, certain expectations of obedience, and those expectations of

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Speaker 3: obedience then become the basis for understanding what the ramifications

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Speaker 3: are if covenant Israel fails within those. You had pointed

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Speaker 3: out that you're not sure that Some of these expectations,

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Speaker 3: especially with regard to stoning rebellious children, were all that

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Speaker 3: often even practiced. I have my own skepticism as to

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Speaker 3: whether they were ever practiced. I took that a step further.

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Speaker 3: I'm not sure that God even expected that to be practiced.

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Speaker 3: To me, it was about the creating of an image.

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Speaker 3: And so I didn't use this example last time, but

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Speaker 3: maybe it's worth to flesh it out in the moment.

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Speaker 3: Henri Blochet has a piece in which he's taking issue

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Speaker 3: with two groups of people. There's this debate between complementarians

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Speaker 3: and egalitarians. And the egalitarians were saying, Henri Blochet, you're

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Speaker 3: a complementarian. And he was upset by that. He said,

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Speaker 3: I am not a complementarian. And so the issue of

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Speaker 3: complementarian versus egalitarianism is specifically who may serve as an

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Speaker 3: elder within the church. The complementarians sit on the side

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Speaker 3: of saying we take literalistically the sorts of claims that

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Speaker 3: Paul makes in his pastoral letters and say that only

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Speaker 3: men can fill those functions. Egalitarians want to say that

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Speaker 3: that's speaking more of a cultural dynamic in particular times

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Speaker 3: and places and really that positions open to anybody, men

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Speaker 3: or women. And egalitarians thought that Boucher was a complementarian,

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Speaker 3: his response is to say, I'm not a complementarian, neither

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Speaker 3: am I an egalitarian. He doesn't use this language, but

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Speaker 3: more or less saying that it's a false binary. But

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Speaker 3: what he puts in its place is he says a

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Speaker 3: theodramatic enactment of reality. God has created a particular pattern

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Speaker 3: for the church to follow in which the primary function

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Speaker 3: is to understand male eldership within a church, but that

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Speaker 3: It's far from making a declaration of what individual churches

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Speaker 3: need to be. It's more to establish a pattern to

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Speaker 3: then place us into that pattern to say, by the way, you,

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Speaker 3: the church, every single one of you, male or female,

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Speaker 3: sit in the female position. And so what you're supposed

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Speaker 3: to be understanding within this visual pattern is what it

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Speaker 3: means to sit before God. Not that God is male

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Speaker 3: in some sort of gendered way that we tend to

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Speaker 3: think about it, but rather that God is in the

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Speaker 3: position as the one who's the only one from whom

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Speaker 3: the church receives its life and is the head from

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Speaker 3: which the church receives its body, receives its identity as body.

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Speaker 3: But in terms of the actual practice of the church,

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Speaker 3: God is free by the gifting of the Spirit to

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Speaker 3: gift anyone, male or female, to be elder or pastor

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Speaker 3: within a church. And so the normative framework described is

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Speaker 3: less a declaration of what is expected than and more

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Speaker 3: a declaration of providing an image that dramatizes us into

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Speaker 3: understanding our position before God in Christ, right? That's a

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Speaker 3: nutshell of what he's trying to say in a very

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Speaker 3: complicated argument. And I wanted to say a similar sort

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Speaker 3: of thing in terms of understanding what God is doing,

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Speaker 3: the enacting of the Old Testament law, Torah, that it's

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Speaker 3: less about God making absolute statements of, here's what must

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Speaker 3: happen when someone is disobedient, namely they be executed. And

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Speaker 3: it was more about creating an image, that now becomes

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Speaker 3: the basis for understanding the drama that God is enacting

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Speaker 3: with regard to redemption. Here's how serious sinfulness is, both

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Speaker 3: as a personal matter and as a structural reality that

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Speaker 3: co-ops us into it. Sin does inevitably bring in and

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Speaker 3: of itself death. We already see that in the declaration

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Speaker 3: at the beginning of Genesis of what happens if the

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Speaker 3: people choose to go And enclose the world in some

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Speaker 3: other way than by the tree of life, right? Specifically

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Speaker 3: by the tree of knowledge, to elevate themselves as gods,

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Speaker 3: the tree of knowledge of good and evil. That organization

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Speaker 3: of the world brings death. But in addition to that,

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Speaker 3: there seems to be some sense in which certain acts

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Speaker 3: bring about that death quicker than others, right? But it

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Speaker 3: wasn't clear to me that those were ever meant to

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Speaker 3: be enacted so much as to create the framework to

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Speaker 3: understand now why God was setting up the sacrificial system

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Speaker 3: and things like the Day of Atonement, Yom Kippur, in

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Speaker 3: order then to set up the larger reality of what

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Speaker 3: God is doing in the act of redemption in Jesus Christ.

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Speaker 3: So this is why Jesus must ultimately come. This is

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Speaker 3: why the cross must inevitably happen. And therefore, the goal

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Speaker 3: is never to say to the people, even in that

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Speaker 3: covenant relationship, your job is to now take life in

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Speaker 3: response to life, but rather, I have already done that,

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Speaker 3: but I've internalized it, taken that upon myself. Mine will

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Speaker 3: be the life that will be taken, right, in the

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Speaker 3: form of my son, Jesus. And that puts an end

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Speaker 3: to this. So now on this side of the cross,

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Speaker 3: the shadow of the cross, let's call it, well, Barth

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Speaker 3: calls the shadow of the cross the other side, but

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Speaker 3: I mean on this side where the church exists, that

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Speaker 3: option's off the table as far as I understand it theologically.

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Speaker 3: And if it's off the table for theological reasons for

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Speaker 3: the church, then to me, from the greater to the lesser,

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Speaker 3: it's certainly off the table for a political nation-state to

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Speaker 3: be acting in that sort of way. But to me,

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Speaker 3: the further ramification is not just that that's off the table,

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Speaker 3: that capital punishment is off the table, but that even

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Speaker 3: the idea of prison is despite our rhetoric, which says

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Speaker 3: that that's what we're trying to do, but in practice

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Speaker 3: doesn't seem to be what's going on, ought to be

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Speaker 3: an institute that's meant to be rehabilitory. Now I get

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Speaker 3: that not all people will be amenable to that. And

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Speaker 3: so other actions are taken and I'm not opposed to

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Speaker 3: say something like life in prison because of a failure

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Speaker 3: to be able to understand a rehabilitory process or to

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Speaker 3: cooperate within that. To me, that is the extreme that

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Speaker 3: comes about due to a person's own decision to fail

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Speaker 3: to be rehabilitated and fail to show repentance and fail

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Speaker 3: to live within a society in a way as to

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Speaker 3: enable society to function without a sense of fear looking

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Speaker 3: over my shoulder. That prevents a society from being able

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Speaker 3: to live without having to think about the fear-mongering of Dateline,

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Speaker 3: if I can put it that way.

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Speaker 1: Fair enough. So it's interesting. I actually agree with your trajectory. Okay.

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Speaker 1: I think where I'm struggling is with its cleanliness.

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Speaker 3: Fair, which is what I commended your view for, its

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Speaker 3: lack of cleanliness.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, because I mean, I have this sense, you know,

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Speaker 2: one of my favorite Old Testament books is Ruth. And

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Speaker 2: I like Ruth because you have this Moabitess who expresses

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Speaker 2: faith in God. And despite God's command in Deuteronomy that

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Speaker 2: Israel is never to make a covenant with the Moabites,

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Speaker 2: here comes Boaz, who also happens to be the son

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Speaker 2: of Rahab, who is the prostitute in Jericho who hid

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Speaker 2: the Israelite spies.

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Speaker 3: Right, the faithful Gentile.

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Speaker 1: Right.

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Speaker 2: You've got all these sort of intermingling of categories in

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Speaker 2: that book. It's fascinating to watch. And now out of

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Speaker 2: this union comes David.

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Speaker 3: Right.

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Speaker 2: The Israelite, the great Israelite king from whom obviously Jesus

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Speaker 2: will descend. And so you've got this this really interesting

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Speaker 2: moment in, I think, Book of Ruth that if I'm

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Speaker 2: interpreting it correctly, riffing on the law. And demonstrating that

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Speaker 2: what the law calls for is a love of neighbor,

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Speaker 2: which we could take as mercy, right? Or mercy as

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Speaker 2: a subcategory of that love of neighbor. And that this

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Speaker 2: is the spirit of the law that overcomes some of

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Speaker 2: the letters, right? It overcomes some of the letters of

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Speaker 2: that law. And so that part, that way you explain

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Speaker 2: that trajectory, I agree with. But then, you know, you

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Speaker 2: have instances in the Old Testament where judgment actually happens.

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Speaker 3: Sure.

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Speaker 2: You know, you have, I'm sure if you ask Nadab

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Speaker 2: and Abihu whether they thought God was merciful, they would

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Speaker 2: say no. You know, these are the gentlemen that offered

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Speaker 2: up strange fire and were killed.

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Speaker 3: Right.

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Speaker 2: They experienced God's judgment almost on the spot. And so,

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Speaker 2: you know, you've got the, uh, the Israelites who, when

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Speaker 2: carrying the Ark back from the Philistia, uh, accidentally stumble,

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Speaker 2: reach out and touch it and die.

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Speaker 1: Right.

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Speaker 2: God is not merciful in every instance in the old Testament,

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Speaker 2: even in the exile of his people.

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Speaker 1: Right. into Babylon, into these other areas.

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Speaker 2: And so I think that as long-suffering as God is,

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Speaker 2: there is a limit to that long-suffering. And so while

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Speaker 2: I think we should learn to discern the law through

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Speaker 2: the lens of love of neighbor and mercy, that cannot

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Speaker 2: preclude judgment, which I don't hear you saying at all.

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Speaker 1: I'm not saying no to judgment.

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Speaker 2: I know you're not saying that. But so I think

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Speaker 2: then the hinge for me is, would there ever be

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Speaker 2: a time when the necessity of executing another human being

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Speaker 2: who has done something heinous would raise to the level

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Speaker 2: above love of neighbor and mercy? I don't think I

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Speaker 2: can bracket that out. I don't think I can bracket

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Speaker 2: that out in ancient Israel. And I agree with you.

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Speaker 2: I don't think they were taking rebellious children out and

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Speaker 2: stoning them. I think that was designed as sort of a,

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Speaker 2: here is the seriousness with which this father, son, daughter, mother, parents,

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Speaker 2: children relationship is supposed to be. As it's the vehicle

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Speaker 2: of the covenant, the next generation need not be rebellious.

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Speaker 2: And if they are rebellious, they need to be cut off. Now,

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Speaker 2: that gets into a whole host of craziness, right? And

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Speaker 2: how these things have to be maneuvered and worked through.

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Speaker 2: But at the end of the day, I take that

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Speaker 2: a lot of those are really related to that, that

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Speaker 2: the covenant had to be biologically assured moving forward, not solely. Obviously,

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Speaker 2: we just talked about Boaz and, you know, and Ruth

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Speaker 2: coming in. But for ancient Israel, biological reproduction was far

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Speaker 2: more significant to covenant propagation than it is in the

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Speaker 2: New Testament, let's say. And that biological propagation had to

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Speaker 2: come along with that next generation understanding and committing to

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Speaker 2: the covenant, not simply being a part of it through

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Speaker 2: the circumcision. And so I think that what you're tapping

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Speaker 2: on in some of those, um, in some of these

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Speaker 2: laws is I would say, correct. I don't know that

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Speaker 2: I would go as far as to say, God never

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Speaker 2: intended for this to happen. But what I would say

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Speaker 2: is I don't think God intended that the first instance

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Speaker 2: of misbehavior on the part of a child, you'd take

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Speaker 2: them out in the back of the Israelite village that

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Speaker 2: you're in and you stone them to death. I think

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Speaker 2: that what we're looking at is more of a, uh,

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Speaker 2: We see this in the case of Eli and Samuel,

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Speaker 2: for instance, in 1 Samuel. Their sons die. And it's

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Speaker 2: because they have no respect for the covenant. They should

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Speaker 2: not keep going. Do Eli and Samuel enact that judgment

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Speaker 2: on their children?

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Speaker 1: They do not. Right?

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Speaker 3: Right.

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Speaker 1: God takes those people.

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Speaker 2: And so you see a lot of this in the

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Speaker 2: Old Testament where God is taking people. You see very

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Speaker 2: little of it when we're looking at it from a

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Speaker 2: governmental perspective and who should or should not die.

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Speaker 1: It's assumed in the law. It's regulated by the law.

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Speaker 2: But you don't actually get a whole lot of narratives

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Speaker 2: where it actually happens.

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Speaker 1: Yeah.

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Speaker 3: Okay, so... The example that came to my mind actually

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Speaker 3: came from the New Testament to potentially bolster your case.

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Speaker 3: And that was when, oh, their names are, I've drawn

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Speaker 3: a blank on their names, but in the book of Acts,

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Speaker 3: this couple that told Peter and the church that they'd

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Speaker 3: sold all their goods and had given all their money

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Speaker 3: to the church for it to be able to distribute

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Speaker 3: communally to help those that needed it, that didn't have it.

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Speaker 3: And they claim they did it, but it turns out

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Speaker 3: they didn't. And then they dropped undead as a sign

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Speaker 3: of punishment, right?

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Speaker 1: Ananias and Sapphira. Yeah.

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Speaker 3: There you go. Ananias and Sapphira. So potentially there's a

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Speaker 3: New Testament example of the same thing, but you sort

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Speaker 3: of already said it. But my response would be, my

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Speaker 3: response is every single one of these examples is.

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Speaker 1: God doing it. Right.

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Speaker 3: So I have no problem saying if God wants to

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Speaker 3: do it, then God can do it. Apparently God has

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Speaker 3: done it.

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Speaker 2: Well, and I will say the interesting thing, you know,

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Speaker 2: you look at the life of David and scholars differ

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Speaker 2: on this. Some people think that, you know, David is

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Speaker 2: viewed as, you know, he's reckless, he's whatever. My read

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Speaker 2: on David, especially in 1 and 2 Samuel, is there's

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Speaker 2: something that I call the Davidic innocence motif. I don't

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Speaker 2: think I'm the only one who calls that, but the

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Speaker 2: Davidic innocence motif is just this. Every time David is

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Speaker 2: confronted with an instance where he can kill another Israelite

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Speaker 2: and potentially advance his way to the throne, he either

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Speaker 2: stops himself from doing it or is stopped from doing it.

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Speaker 2: So take like Nabal and Abigail, that narrative. David's on

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Speaker 2: his way to kill Nabal because Nabal won't help him

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Speaker 2: and his men. Abigail meets David on the road, gives

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Speaker 2: him provisions and says, listen, my husband's a fool, which

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Speaker 2: Nabal in Hebrew is fool. And so, you know, hey,

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Speaker 2: don't mess with this. You know, like, don't mess with

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Speaker 2: this guy. Just leave him alone. It'll all get taken

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Speaker 2: care of. And of course, Nabal dies, like, you know,

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Speaker 2: a few days later. And then David marries Abigail. And

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Speaker 2: so that's one of those instances where David is stopped.

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Speaker 2: The other one, you know, is where Saul comes into

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Speaker 2: the cave where David is hiding and he refuses to

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Speaker 2: do anything but cut off the piece of his cloak.

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Speaker 2: when he could have killed him. You have this all

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Speaker 2: the way through 1 and 2 Samuel. David's inaction against Absalom,

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Speaker 2: his inaction against Shammai, who is Saul's relative, his inaction

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Speaker 2: against anyone in his family, really, who does anything wrong.

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Speaker 2: And the setup is just that, you know, when Absalom

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Speaker 2: takes vengeance on Abner for the rape of his sister,

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Speaker 2: this is viewed as a negative act.

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Speaker 1: It's justice, but it's not written that way.

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Speaker 2: It's written now as Absalom allowing this to fester in himself,

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Speaker 2: to take over the throne from his father. It leads

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Speaker 2: him to miss something deeper, perhaps, in the law, which

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Speaker 2: is this notion of mercy. over judgment, but he really

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Speaker 2: seems like cultivates a lot of bitterness toward his father,

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Speaker 2: ends up trying to take over the throne from David

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Speaker 2: and chases David out of Jerusalem for a while. So,

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Speaker 2: I mean, all these different instances, I guess, is it, I'm,

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Speaker 2: I'm sort of arguing your point. You're kind of arguing

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Speaker 2: mine to some degree. It's like, but I, I don't know.

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Speaker 2: So here's what I would say. I don't know that

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Speaker 2: we see all these instances where God is caring for

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Speaker 2: the justice in Israel and caring for carrying out the

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Speaker 2: judgment in Israel. I don't know that because we're seeing

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Speaker 2: that we should assume that humans shouldn't.

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Speaker 1: Right.

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Speaker 2: I think there is supposed to be an imitation and

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Speaker 2: a mirroring. Um, But I think to your point, there

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Speaker 2: should also be an imitation and a mirroring to the

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Speaker 2: long-suffering and mercy that we show even in the punishment

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Speaker 2: of those who have wronged us or sinned against God's order.

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Speaker 3: So I think there's a well-proven New Testament adage of

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Speaker 3: the law condemns, which maybe can be overstated sometimes. I've

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Speaker 3: heard it overstated as of this just as previously. by nature,

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Speaker 3: what all law is condemning. But I think the larger

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Speaker 3: point is that law cannot show mercy. Law is just

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Speaker 3: merely a tool of drawing lines. It's a technology of sorts.

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Speaker 3: It's a way of being able to describe for a

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Speaker 3: society what the boundaries are, but also instituting within it

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Speaker 3: the mechanisms for certifying those lines, why those lines exist,

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Speaker 3: and how those lines will be upheld. So it can't

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Speaker 3: show mercy, and in that sense it is meant to condemn,

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Speaker 3: not to say that there can be no mercy within

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Speaker 3: the confines of the law. And maybe that's where the

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Speaker 3: rub is, because even though we're not talking about a

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Speaker 3: covenant situation when we speak of a modern nation-state, it

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Speaker 3: does have laws, and it's when those laws are violated

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Speaker 3: that we end up with the question of whether they're

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Speaker 3: violated in particular or heinous ways, of whether there could

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Speaker 3: and should be capital punishment. But I'm not sure that

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Speaker 3: appealing to law ever answers that question. I think that

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Speaker 3: might be where we run into what feels like paradox

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Speaker 3: in the Old Testament that I wanted to say from

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Speaker 3: Hosea is probably not paradox. Because I want to say

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Speaker 3: that the love of God precedes law, and that law

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Speaker 3: as a function of the love of God shows that

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Speaker 3: that love is not just some esoteric thing that has

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Speaker 3: no expectations and boundaries built into it. But the expectations

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Speaker 3: and the boundaries are not identical with the love. They

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Speaker 3: don't replace the love. And so the other side of

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Speaker 3: that is out of the love of God, you also

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Speaker 3: get mercy and grace. But mercy and grace are meaningful

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Speaker 3: things without the law side of it as well. If

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Speaker 3: we just talk about mercy and grace, but there's no

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Speaker 3: expectations tied to it, then mercy of what? Grace toward what?

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Speaker 3: Or over and against what? So when I look at

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Speaker 3: something like the book of Hosea, the element of God's

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Speaker 3: wrath that comes out, that's just, again, as I said before,

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Speaker 3: very uncomfortable to read, is uncomfortable because of how strongly

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Speaker 3: it's worded. But then when you move from that into

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Speaker 3: the element where God's mercy and love comes out, where

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Speaker 3: God says, I'm not going to do this, and he

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Speaker 3: explicitly cites his love for them as to why he's

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Speaker 3: not going to undertake all these acts, that would be

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Speaker 3: properly speaking, appropriate within the lines and boundaries of what

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Speaker 3: those laws have made. But it doesn't encompass the entirety

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Speaker 3: of God's love. To me, that's sort of the framework

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Speaker 3: at play here, right? Where the judgment elements are real,

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Speaker 3: and the judgment elements are speaking in accordance with that

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Speaker 3: aspect of the drawing of lines and boundaries. And that

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Speaker 3: judgment level also makes sense of the mercy and the grace.

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Speaker 3: If we don't see judgment, it is all bound up

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Speaker 3: in that. Then we don't see mercy and grace. So

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Speaker 3: to me, it's completely understandable to say there are occasions

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Speaker 3: within which God takes these matters into his own hands

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Speaker 3: and brings about the judgment. Why he does in these

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Speaker 3: moments what made these especially worse than other moments, I

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Speaker 3: don't know. We can, I suppose, discern some basic patterns.

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Speaker 3: But I think the level of pattern that I'm comfortable

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Speaker 3: with is to say they demonstrate God as long-suffering. And

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Speaker 3: at a certain point, long-suffering does have its own boundaries.

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Speaker 3: And I'm comfortable with saying God is able to discern

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Speaker 3: what those boundaries are to his long-suffering. in a way

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Speaker 3: that makes long-suffering, again, important. If you say long-suffering never

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Speaker 3: has an end, then it's not long-suffering. It's just looking

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Speaker 3: the other way. There has to be a boundary, I think,

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Speaker 3: that makes perfect sense. I sort of say this to

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Speaker 3: my kids at times, right, where they may not be

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Speaker 3: happy that I've disciplined them, but let's recount what led

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Speaker 3: to this moment. And I'll do this for them. I'll

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Speaker 3: walk through this past process because I want them to

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Speaker 3: see that this wasn't all of a sudden. This was

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Speaker 3: I was patient. I was patient. I was patient. I

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Speaker 3: was patient. I gave you these series of corrections. We've

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Speaker 3: reached the end of that. What's become apparent in these

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Speaker 3: moments with my kids is that the patience got us nowhere,

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Speaker 3: and I don't regret the patience. But you do need

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Speaker 3: to see that while I do value patience and I

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Speaker 3: want to build that within them as an important tool,

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Speaker 3: that there still has to be a point at which

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Speaker 3: The patience makes way because they need to see that

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Speaker 3: it is important that they do X, Y, and Z.

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Speaker 3: They follow certain boundaries. To me, that's sort of a

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Speaker 3: parallel in my imperfect way as to what the end

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Speaker 3: of God's long-suffering is. But again, I want to load

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Speaker 3: that onto him and say, you know what? God knows

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Speaker 3: where the boundaries of his patience is. And sometimes the

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Speaker 3: boundaries of his patience, just like with my kids, seem

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Speaker 3: a lot less patient than they actually are. and my

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Speaker 3: hope is to be formed by the narrative to understand, no,

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Speaker 3: there was actually a lot of patience. I just missed

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Speaker 3: the milestone markers. But to me, that hard mark of

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Speaker 3: the no, where it's more clean, as you put it,

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Speaker 3: is I don't trust government institutions to be able to

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Speaker 3: mark that point of saying, we've reached the point of

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Speaker 3: the end of the hope of your repentance. I don't

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Speaker 3: know that it's up to us to be able to say,

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Speaker 3: you no longer are capable of exercising any degree of repentance.

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Speaker 3: And therefore, I'm taking it upon myself, or we're taking

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Speaker 3: it upon ourselves to say, the timeline has ended. To me,

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Speaker 3: that's sort of a, not sort of, that is a

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Speaker 3: God line that I'm not willing to transgress.

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Speaker 1: I think that's fair.

432
00:26:31,070 --> 00:26:36,310
Speaker 2: I think that, you know, I had an Old Testament scholar,

433
00:26:36,410 --> 00:26:39,870
Speaker 2: Jillian Ross, on the show, sometime back, and she talked

434
00:26:39,910 --> 00:26:42,990
Speaker 2: about an article she'd written for Jets on the book

435
00:26:43,020 --> 00:26:45,940
Speaker 2: of Judges. And one of the things she draws out

436
00:26:46,020 --> 00:26:51,720
Speaker 2: is this notion that Gideon, Jephthah, these are men who

437
00:26:52,300 --> 00:26:54,820
Speaker 2: God shows mercy to, right?

438
00:26:55,480 --> 00:26:56,780
Speaker 1: Gideon's clan is.

439
00:26:59,130 --> 00:27:04,590
Speaker 2: Worshiping Baal and they want Gideon dead, and yet they

440
00:27:04,630 --> 00:27:08,149
Speaker 2: allow God allows them to join this battle and to

441
00:27:08,190 --> 00:27:12,040
Speaker 2: bring victory to ancient Israel during the time of the judges.

442
00:27:13,180 --> 00:27:17,500
Speaker 2: And yet when Gideon has control over the people and

443
00:27:17,560 --> 00:27:22,140
Speaker 2: he's sort of back in power, he shows no mercy

444
00:27:22,280 --> 00:27:27,300
Speaker 2: to the Israelites who refused him provisions. Jephthah has a

445
00:27:27,320 --> 00:27:32,240
Speaker 2: very similar story. Jephthah is the son of like sort

446
00:27:32,260 --> 00:27:34,440
Speaker 2: of a half-brother of all these people. He gets kicked

447
00:27:34,500 --> 00:27:37,139
Speaker 2: out of his tribe, you know, booted from his inheritance.

448
00:27:37,850 --> 00:27:41,570
Speaker 2: But he develops sort of a reputation as a warrior.

449
00:27:41,950 --> 00:27:44,310
Speaker 2: When Israel gets in trouble, they ask him to come help.

450
00:27:44,710 --> 00:27:47,030
Speaker 2: He sort of negotiates that he's going to then be

451
00:27:47,270 --> 00:27:50,429
Speaker 2: put atop. And then he makes this errant vow at

452
00:27:50,470 --> 00:27:53,129
Speaker 2: the end where he ends up having to kill his

453
00:27:53,190 --> 00:27:56,119
Speaker 2: own daughter. And so his rule is never going to

454
00:27:56,160 --> 00:27:58,220
Speaker 2: last any longer than just one generation.

455
00:27:58,280 --> 00:27:59,200
Speaker 1: It just ends with him.

456
00:28:00,540 --> 00:28:02,900
Speaker 2: In both of those cases, what we see is sort

457
00:28:02,940 --> 00:28:11,869
Speaker 2: of this inversion of self-interest and ambition over an indignation, maybe,

458
00:28:12,830 --> 00:28:16,810
Speaker 2: over mercy, a lack of recognition of what God has

459
00:28:16,910 --> 00:28:20,720
Speaker 2: done for us. In this case, Gideon and Jephthah, what

460
00:28:20,740 --> 00:28:24,660
Speaker 2: God has done for Gideon and Jephthah, and a lack

461
00:28:26,950 --> 00:28:31,490
Speaker 2: and a desire to get retribution for wrongs done to them.

462
00:28:32,730 --> 00:28:35,109
Speaker 2: And so there's a real selfish ambition sort of to it.

463
00:28:37,190 --> 00:28:39,020
Speaker 2: As I think through that, and I think through what

464
00:28:39,040 --> 00:28:42,140
Speaker 2: you're saying, I think part of what I think we

465
00:28:42,180 --> 00:28:45,920
Speaker 2: need to sort of draw out here is we often

466
00:28:45,960 --> 00:28:49,980
Speaker 2: think of capital punishment as something that's being done to

467
00:28:50,060 --> 00:28:54,040
Speaker 2: someone who has taken a human life or has someone

468
00:28:54,080 --> 00:28:56,700
Speaker 2: who has done something deserving of death, let's say.

469
00:28:57,160 --> 00:28:58,380
Speaker 1: We think about the perpetrator.

470
00:29:00,570 --> 00:29:02,170
Speaker 2: But part of what I think we're teasing out in

471
00:29:02,190 --> 00:29:05,890
Speaker 2: this conversation is it isn't really just about the perpetrator.

472
00:29:08,270 --> 00:29:12,110
Speaker 2: When we give blanket license to anyone to enact any

473
00:29:12,170 --> 00:29:18,600
Speaker 2: sort of judgment, that's a problem. That individual can't just

474
00:29:18,630 --> 00:29:20,800
Speaker 2: sit back and look at his checklist and go, okay,

475
00:29:21,480 --> 00:29:24,880
Speaker 2: we're going to run the bootleg and this guy's going

476
00:29:24,900 --> 00:29:27,380
Speaker 2: to run down 10 yards and then turn in. There

477
00:29:27,420 --> 00:29:29,800
Speaker 2: has to be some sort of an improvisation to the

478
00:29:29,840 --> 00:29:33,940
Speaker 2: game because there has to be room for this sort

479
00:29:33,960 --> 00:29:38,180
Speaker 2: of logical thinking about love of neighbor and mercy within

480
00:29:38,240 --> 00:29:41,640
Speaker 2: that sort of act of judgment. And so it just

481
00:29:41,660 --> 00:29:43,459
Speaker 2: seems to me that as we look at this, we

482
00:29:43,520 --> 00:29:46,280
Speaker 2: have to sort of sit back and say, as God

483
00:29:46,360 --> 00:29:49,740
Speaker 2: puts people in place, rulers in place to enact judgment,

484
00:29:51,300 --> 00:29:53,980
Speaker 2: those rulers are going to ultimately be held accountable for

485
00:29:54,000 --> 00:29:58,000
Speaker 2: the type of judgment that they exercise. And that this

486
00:29:58,060 --> 00:30:01,030
Speaker 2: should be something that we probably talk a little bit

487
00:30:01,070 --> 00:30:06,410
Speaker 2: more about. How does that judgment, that way of enacting judgment,

488
00:30:06,970 --> 00:30:09,290
Speaker 2: what is the thought process that.

489
00:30:09,290 --> 00:30:12,070
Speaker 1: One should be going through in order to get to

490
00:30:12,130 --> 00:30:12,770
Speaker 1: a point.

491
00:30:12,530 --> 00:30:17,710
Speaker 2: Where there's a decision made of what judgment to mete out?

492
00:30:18,560 --> 00:30:20,210
Speaker 2: I think probably the clearest examples of this in the

493
00:30:20,260 --> 00:30:24,700
Speaker 2: Old Testament is, you know, God calling Babylon his servant.

494
00:30:25,660 --> 00:30:28,540
Speaker 2: And then like two verses later saying, don't worry, they'll

495
00:30:28,560 --> 00:30:32,180
Speaker 2: be punished for what they do to my people. And

496
00:30:32,240 --> 00:30:36,080
Speaker 2: so they are the judgment on Israel, but because of

497
00:30:36,140 --> 00:30:39,970
Speaker 2: the way they enact that judgment, they also are going

498
00:30:39,990 --> 00:30:44,250
Speaker 2: to be judged. And I think that there's just a

499
00:30:44,310 --> 00:30:47,570
Speaker 2: part of me that's sort of, yeah, there should be

500
00:30:47,590 --> 00:30:51,390
Speaker 2: a way of going about handling these matters, even in

501
00:30:51,430 --> 00:30:57,110
Speaker 2: the governmental sphere. Not that says no judgment, no punishment,

502
00:30:57,330 --> 00:30:59,550
Speaker 2: total anarchy, go and do whatever you want. We're all

503
00:30:59,570 --> 00:31:01,650
Speaker 2: just going to have mercy and all those kind of things.

504
00:31:01,670 --> 00:31:04,050
Speaker 2: Because your point, there is no mercy if there is

505
00:31:04,090 --> 00:31:06,910
Speaker 2: no judgment. If nothing's wrong, if we're not going to

506
00:31:06,950 --> 00:31:10,510
Speaker 2: say anything's wrong, there's really no need for mercy. We

507
00:31:10,550 --> 00:31:12,970
Speaker 2: just have what we have. There's not even a name

508
00:31:13,020 --> 00:31:16,920
Speaker 2: for it. But I do think that as we look

509
00:31:16,980 --> 00:31:19,060
Speaker 2: at it, we should say maybe what we should be

510
00:31:19,120 --> 00:31:24,590
Speaker 2: thinking through is what's good? for our neighbor? What does

511
00:31:24,650 --> 00:31:28,580
Speaker 2: it mean to love neighbor in this situation? As complex

512
00:31:28,640 --> 00:31:32,580
Speaker 2: as that question is, and how should that condition these judgments?

513
00:31:33,860 --> 00:31:39,330
Speaker 2: I think probably, though I didn't say it in the

514
00:31:39,370 --> 00:31:43,610
Speaker 2: last episode on capital punishment, that probably lies beneath a

515
00:31:44,010 --> 00:31:48,450
Speaker 2: fair amount of my thinking with regard to why I'm

516
00:31:49,690 --> 00:31:55,240
Speaker 2: opposed to capital punishment being meted out today. Because I'm

517
00:31:55,340 --> 00:31:58,700
Speaker 2: not sure that I see it as, number one, yes,

518
00:31:58,760 --> 00:32:03,040
Speaker 2: it's an alternative, but is it a necessary alternative? And

519
00:32:03,220 --> 00:32:08,200
Speaker 2: why is it that we wouldn't just do life in prison, right?

520
00:32:08,340 --> 00:32:13,640
Speaker 2: And allow this person more time, even though they've taken

521
00:32:13,720 --> 00:32:18,480
Speaker 2: time from someone else? I think that there is a

522
00:32:18,540 --> 00:32:24,380
Speaker 2: sense in which that, we call it the tendency to mercy,

523
00:32:25,000 --> 00:32:29,240
Speaker 2: to me should be privileged. And I think there's a

524
00:32:29,290 --> 00:32:31,390
Speaker 2: good case to be made for that from the Old

525
00:32:31,430 --> 00:32:32,170
Speaker 2: Testament itself.

526
00:32:35,770 --> 00:32:38,190
Speaker 3: Do you think, I've heard it said, maybe start it

527
00:32:38,210 --> 00:32:42,570
Speaker 3: this way, I've heard it said that an important reason

528
00:32:42,650 --> 00:32:50,130
Speaker 3: for capital punishment, particularly in first-degree murder cases, and convictions,

529
00:32:50,150 --> 00:32:54,620
Speaker 3: is in order to give... It's the highest form of

530
00:32:54,690 --> 00:33:00,840
Speaker 3: justice given to the family who has lost someone. What

531
00:33:00,860 --> 00:33:04,660
Speaker 3: do you think about that? Do you think... I mean,

532
00:33:04,960 --> 00:33:07,240
Speaker 3: you can already infer my answer, considering I made a

533
00:33:07,260 --> 00:33:07,740
Speaker 3: hard line.

534
00:33:07,760 --> 00:33:09,200
Speaker 1: I mean... Yeah.

535
00:33:10,080 --> 00:33:10,440
Speaker 3: I mean.

536
00:33:17,210 --> 00:33:23,260
Speaker 2: Let me say it like this. Even in the little

537
00:33:23,480 --> 00:33:26,720
Speaker 2: hurt that I have experienced in my life, which has

538
00:33:26,760 --> 00:33:30,460
Speaker 2: been pretty minimal, I understand the impetus.

539
00:33:32,500 --> 00:33:32,960
Speaker 1: I get it.

540
00:33:34,330 --> 00:33:36,710
Speaker 2: But I would also say that as someone who has

541
00:33:38,170 --> 00:33:41,390
Speaker 2: had the experience of being hurt and sort of getting

542
00:33:41,490 --> 00:33:46,830
Speaker 2: some level of retribution, that it didn't help. And so I,

543
00:33:47,290 --> 00:33:51,390
Speaker 2: you know, my framework is, yeah, I understand the impetus.

544
00:33:51,870 --> 00:33:54,210
Speaker 2: I might even be inclined that way myself for it

545
00:33:54,300 --> 00:33:56,740
Speaker 2: to happen to one of my children or my wife

546
00:33:56,800 --> 00:34:00,700
Speaker 2: or something like that. Um, but if I take the

547
00:34:00,740 --> 00:34:06,910
Speaker 2: emotion out of it, I'm not sure that I see

548
00:34:06,990 --> 00:34:09,009
Speaker 2: it as a higher form.

549
00:34:08,770 --> 00:34:10,430
Speaker 1: Of justice than anything else.

550
00:34:12,250 --> 00:34:14,770
Speaker 2: Um, I'm willing to admit that I think there is

551
00:34:14,870 --> 00:34:19,550
Speaker 2: a line where I would say that's injustice. I think

552
00:34:19,660 --> 00:34:23,740
Speaker 2: that some of the laws related to, for instance, sexual

553
00:34:23,780 --> 00:34:32,589
Speaker 2: assault in our country border on injustice. At the same time,

554
00:34:33,130 --> 00:34:35,730
Speaker 2: when I look at it from a biblical and theological perspective,

555
00:34:36,750 --> 00:34:40,140
Speaker 2: I'm not really sure that I see the family in

556
00:34:40,300 --> 00:34:43,719
Speaker 2: any sort of biblical rationale. I can't think of a

557
00:34:43,760 --> 00:34:47,640
Speaker 2: time when family is rooted in any biblical rationale that

558
00:34:48,420 --> 00:34:51,319
Speaker 2: this justice is to be meted out because it is

559
00:34:52,260 --> 00:34:58,819
Speaker 2: helpful to the survivors of someone who's been killed. The

560
00:34:58,860 --> 00:35:01,880
Speaker 2: register seems to me to be far more in line

561
00:35:01,940 --> 00:35:05,590
Speaker 2: with the preservation of holiness within the community of faith,

562
00:35:06,300 --> 00:35:09,150
Speaker 2: the perpetuation of the covenant line, the.

563
00:35:12,260 --> 00:35:18,110
Speaker 1: The dignity of the image of God. And so, yeah, I'm.

564
00:35:18,010 --> 00:35:22,029
Speaker 2: Inclined to say I don't buy that rationale, although I

565
00:35:22,110 --> 00:35:23,910
Speaker 2: certainly empathize with it.

566
00:35:26,890 --> 00:35:31,299
Speaker 3: Yeah, I'm inclined to agree with you. It's not entirely

567
00:35:31,360 --> 00:35:37,960
Speaker 3: clear to me that something like capital punishment will make

568
00:35:38,040 --> 00:35:43,009
Speaker 3: someone's sense of loss and pain go away. Or that

569
00:35:43,050 --> 00:35:46,279
Speaker 3: it'll make them feel like, well, you know, I know

570
00:35:46,340 --> 00:35:48,620
Speaker 3: I lost my kid or my spouse or my friend,

571
00:35:50,420 --> 00:35:53,180
Speaker 3: but at least he's dead too, or she's dead too.

572
00:35:55,260 --> 00:35:58,000
Speaker 3: I think there's something real to... I've spent a lot

573
00:35:58,020 --> 00:36:02,859
Speaker 3: of time reflecting for other reasons upon the biblical claim

574
00:36:02,900 --> 00:36:05,100
Speaker 3: repeated in the New Testament that vengeance is mine, says

575
00:36:05,140 --> 00:36:09,080
Speaker 3: the Lord, of why. Why does it not say.

576
00:36:13,930 --> 00:36:16,200
Speaker 3: Vengeance is not the way to go. Instead, it says,

577
00:36:16,260 --> 00:36:19,859
Speaker 3: vengeance is mine, says the Lord. I think that it's

578
00:36:19,960 --> 00:36:25,940
Speaker 3: not ours to enact. It's pretty straightforwardly borne out by

579
00:36:25,980 --> 00:36:28,600
Speaker 3: the fact that it doesn't take away the sense of loss,

580
00:36:28,660 --> 00:36:29,720
Speaker 3: doesn't take away the sense of pain.

581
00:36:29,760 --> 00:36:30,390
Speaker 1: If anything, it.

582
00:36:32,670 --> 00:36:34,969
Speaker 3: Can sear you, right? It can sear your heart in

583
00:36:35,010 --> 00:36:40,109
Speaker 3: a way in which the reality of that loss now

584
00:36:40,150 --> 00:36:44,620
Speaker 3: defines you in ways that you can never overcome. And

585
00:36:44,640 --> 00:36:48,870
Speaker 3: we've talked previously about that one. I think Christopher Nolan

586
00:36:48,930 --> 00:36:51,610
Speaker 3: shows that well in his Dark Knight trilogy and what

587
00:36:51,630 --> 00:36:56,810
Speaker 3: he's doing with Batman. And I think the makers of

588
00:36:56,850 --> 00:36:59,350
Speaker 3: the Supergirl movie, despite its being maligned, show that really

589
00:36:59,390 --> 00:37:03,150
Speaker 3: well with the logic of how their story unfolds. But

590
00:37:03,170 --> 00:37:06,830
Speaker 3: I think equally on the other side of that is

591
00:37:07,050 --> 00:37:11,989
Speaker 3: why is vengeance God's? Because I think While maybe there's

592
00:37:12,030 --> 00:37:18,320
Speaker 3: something rhetorical at play there in that it's not exactly

593
00:37:18,400 --> 00:37:21,640
Speaker 3: vengeance if you're not the one carrying. If you're carrying

594
00:37:21,760 --> 00:37:27,080
Speaker 3: out the judgment that isn't something done directly against you

595
00:37:28,400 --> 00:37:31,930
Speaker 3: because you're taking out that component of, ooh, I'm making

596
00:37:31,969 --> 00:37:34,450
Speaker 3: up for what was done to me. there is still

597
00:37:34,489 --> 00:37:37,690
Speaker 3: something we said about all things done against someone else

598
00:37:37,730 --> 00:37:40,549
Speaker 3: in some ways do bear upon God, right? As the

599
00:37:40,670 --> 00:37:43,689
Speaker 3: one who, who has created this world, who has made

600
00:37:43,730 --> 00:37:45,609
Speaker 3: this world to operate in a certain kind of way.

601
00:37:45,630 --> 00:37:48,220
Speaker 3: And it's a slap in God's face to, to operate

602
00:37:48,260 --> 00:37:51,200
Speaker 3: in a different kind of way. It really is saying

603
00:37:51,260 --> 00:37:56,399
Speaker 3: I can do this better. So in that sense, there

604
00:37:56,520 --> 00:38:00,080
Speaker 3: is a sense in which it would, it's personal, but

605
00:38:00,140 --> 00:38:03,689
Speaker 3: we can trust that God's doing it isn't merely a cheap,

606
00:38:05,300 --> 00:38:10,399
Speaker 3: of personal for personal. That we can trust God's way

607
00:38:10,420 --> 00:38:15,140
Speaker 3: of doing things is thinking long-term. It is thinking about

608
00:38:15,500 --> 00:38:20,260
Speaker 3: the perpetrator as well. It's thinking about a long-suffering patient

609
00:38:20,320 --> 00:38:23,040
Speaker 3: sort of sense. And it's thinking at a certain point,

610
00:38:23,560 --> 00:38:29,680
Speaker 3: God can answer better than any of us can when

611
00:38:29,700 --> 00:38:33,009
Speaker 3: a certain person is done, right? And so we can

612
00:38:33,090 --> 00:38:37,920
Speaker 3: trust that the vengeance being God's is a meaningful claim

613
00:38:37,960 --> 00:38:40,299
Speaker 3: in a way that it's not for us. We're not

614
00:38:40,360 --> 00:38:43,060
Speaker 3: thinking about the perpetrator in any redemptive way when we

615
00:38:43,100 --> 00:38:47,120
Speaker 3: think vengefully. We're not thinking about the idea of repentance

616
00:38:47,320 --> 00:38:49,640
Speaker 3: or reconciliation. We're merely just thinking, well, it'll make me

617
00:38:49,680 --> 00:38:51,300
Speaker 3: feel better, and the irony is that it won't.

618
00:38:53,340 --> 00:38:56,950
Speaker 2: Yeah, I think there's a connection here, and I want

619
00:38:57,260 --> 00:38:59,189
Speaker 2: to be careful because I don't want to connect this

620
00:38:59,290 --> 00:39:03,219
Speaker 2: to capital punishment necessarily. But in the Ten Commandments, when

621
00:39:04,040 --> 00:39:08,340
Speaker 2: God says, thou shalt not murder, my tendency is to

622
00:39:08,390 --> 00:39:13,390
Speaker 2: read that in terms of don't let another human, don't

623
00:39:13,450 --> 00:39:15,830
Speaker 2: view another human as such an obstacle that the only

624
00:39:15,870 --> 00:39:17,549
Speaker 2: way to get through them is to kill them.

625
00:39:18,570 --> 00:39:20,290
Speaker 1: You should never want anything that bad.

626
00:39:21,670 --> 00:39:26,649
Speaker 2: And I think that there's a through line here, sort

627
00:39:26,690 --> 00:39:29,609
Speaker 2: of an emergent pattern that comes out as we look

628
00:39:29,650 --> 00:39:33,160
Speaker 2: at the way God encourages us to think about our

629
00:39:33,200 --> 00:39:38,739
Speaker 2: relationships with other human beings. And it is, thou shalt

630
00:39:38,800 --> 00:39:42,239
Speaker 2: not covet. Let me order things for you and trust

631
00:39:42,260 --> 00:39:45,500
Speaker 2: that I've ordered them well. What they have, they should have.

632
00:39:45,540 --> 00:39:46,640
Speaker 2: What you have, you should have.

633
00:39:48,110 --> 00:39:51,680
Speaker 1: Right. And and what I give you later, that's just

634
00:39:52,140 --> 00:39:52,700
Speaker 1: that's different.

635
00:39:53,060 --> 00:39:53,279
Speaker 3: Right.

636
00:39:53,920 --> 00:39:57,520
Speaker 2: But the idea is that this coveting instinct is to

637
00:39:57,620 --> 00:40:00,120
Speaker 2: preserve the order that God has provided and to be

638
00:40:00,160 --> 00:40:00,930
Speaker 2: content within it.

639
00:40:02,280 --> 00:40:04,050
Speaker 1: Thou shall not steal. Right.

640
00:40:04,489 --> 00:40:09,290
Speaker 2: Don't seek your own provision in inappropriate ways. I would

641
00:40:09,350 --> 00:40:11,370
Speaker 2: argue that that's connected in with the Sabbath.

642
00:40:12,890 --> 00:40:13,109
Speaker 3: Right.

643
00:40:13,670 --> 00:40:17,780
Speaker 2: Trust in God's provisions. That is the positive practice of Sabbath.

644
00:40:17,980 --> 00:40:19,680
Speaker 2: We're going to trust God that even if we don't

645
00:40:19,760 --> 00:40:21,920
Speaker 2: work today, that he is still going to provide for

646
00:40:22,000 --> 00:40:25,980
Speaker 2: us as we saw in the wilderness wanderings. But we're

647
00:40:26,020 --> 00:40:29,880
Speaker 2: also not going to steal, actively seek after additional provision,

648
00:40:30,100 --> 00:40:33,780
Speaker 2: taking from our neighbor because God seemingly has not given

649
00:40:33,860 --> 00:40:36,260
Speaker 2: us what we wanted or has not given us enough

650
00:40:36,380 --> 00:40:39,120
Speaker 2: of what we wanted. And I think when we look

651
00:40:39,160 --> 00:40:43,010
Speaker 2: at murder in that context, we also see that Humans

652
00:40:43,090 --> 00:40:46,910
Speaker 2: now can become an obstacle. If we go back to

653
00:40:46,950 --> 00:40:51,759
Speaker 2: the Cain and Abel narrative, which is one of my favorites,

654
00:40:52,520 --> 00:40:58,940
Speaker 2: Abel becomes an obstacle for Cain. Cain offers the inadequate sacrifice.

655
00:40:59,080 --> 00:41:04,060
Speaker 2: Abel offers the sacrifice that is accepted. God says to Cain,

656
00:41:04,540 --> 00:41:06,560
Speaker 2: you know what to do. If you just do what

657
00:41:06,620 --> 00:41:09,700
Speaker 2: is right, you're not going to have a problem. But

658
00:41:09,739 --> 00:41:13,549
Speaker 2: Cain doesn't want to do what's right. But the problem

659
00:41:13,640 --> 00:41:15,090
Speaker 2: is that he's sort of in the middle of a

660
00:41:15,190 --> 00:41:18,210
Speaker 2: squeeze play. And so he's got to eliminate one of

661
00:41:18,250 --> 00:41:21,629
Speaker 2: these characters. And Cain is the, or I'm sorry, Abel

662
00:41:21,690 --> 00:41:25,870
Speaker 2: is the logical one to eliminate because God is not

663
00:41:25,890 --> 00:41:26,770
Speaker 2: going to be eliminated.

664
00:41:27,170 --> 00:41:27,330
Speaker 3: Yeah.

665
00:41:27,910 --> 00:41:29,830
Speaker 2: And so, you know, this is what he tries. And

666
00:41:29,870 --> 00:41:34,120
Speaker 2: so in this moment, Cain, Abel becomes an obstacle that

667
00:41:34,160 --> 00:41:37,860
Speaker 2: Cain decides he needs to overcome by killing him. And

668
00:41:37,890 --> 00:41:39,910
Speaker 2: so I think there's a, like I said, there's an

669
00:41:39,989 --> 00:41:42,330
Speaker 2: emergent pattern here of the way that we are supposed

670
00:41:42,350 --> 00:41:44,310
Speaker 2: to interact with one another. And I think it's a, uh,

671
00:41:45,430 --> 00:41:50,030
Speaker 2: an appropriate way to argue against the death penalty. Even today,

672
00:41:50,050 --> 00:41:54,390
Speaker 2: there's still a part of me that I would say,

673
00:41:54,410 --> 00:41:58,879
Speaker 2: I don't want it off the table completely. And I don't,

674
00:41:58,980 --> 00:42:02,120
Speaker 2: that's not me saying, I think there are some crimes

675
00:42:02,140 --> 00:42:05,510
Speaker 2: that are so severe that they warrant it or that, um,

676
00:42:06,040 --> 00:42:08,740
Speaker 2: At some point, we're just going to know when mercy

677
00:42:09,060 --> 00:42:12,520
Speaker 2: runs out. But I don't think I want to be

678
00:42:12,640 --> 00:42:16,590
Speaker 2: so hard pushing on the brakes and saying, you know, no, no, no,

679
00:42:16,590 --> 00:42:22,870
Speaker 2: and making that sort of absolute claim. I still want

680
00:42:22,910 --> 00:42:25,469
Speaker 2: to leave it open, but I want to leave it

681
00:42:25,610 --> 00:42:30,250
Speaker 2: open after high doses of mercy and long suffering.

682
00:42:31,290 --> 00:42:33,370
Speaker 3: Yeah, it's a really high bar for you, and I

683
00:42:33,390 --> 00:42:34,049
Speaker 3: appreciate that.

684
00:42:34,530 --> 00:42:34,690
Speaker 1: Yeah.

685
00:42:35,989 --> 00:42:38,779
Speaker 3: I want to throw in another what I've heard. So

686
00:42:38,800 --> 00:42:41,819
Speaker 3: I've heard it said that if you don't have that

687
00:42:41,940 --> 00:42:46,380
Speaker 3: line that results in capital punishment, it's a show of

688
00:42:46,460 --> 00:42:50,359
Speaker 3: weakness to those out there that would be think, think

689
00:42:50,400 --> 00:42:53,750
Speaker 3: the most heinous serial killers, right. Of which we have,

690
00:42:53,810 --> 00:42:58,469
Speaker 3: unfortunately a high number, right. The HH Holmes types, um,

691
00:42:58,489 --> 00:43:03,070
Speaker 3: the Zodiac killer, those, those sorts of folks. Um, If

692
00:43:03,090 --> 00:43:05,650
Speaker 3: you don't have that very clear line in the sand of,

693
00:43:06,170 --> 00:43:09,700
Speaker 3: we draw a line, you will face execution, then it's

694
00:43:09,739 --> 00:43:13,920
Speaker 3: a sign of weakness to those folks that can't be

695
00:43:13,980 --> 00:43:15,560
Speaker 3: reasoned with. What do you think?

696
00:43:20,280 --> 00:43:23,840
Speaker 2: I think it's very difficult to understand how crazy people

697
00:43:23,900 --> 00:43:26,220
Speaker 2: would perceive mercy.

698
00:43:28,420 --> 00:43:30,220
Speaker 1: But I don't think mercy is weakness.

699
00:43:31,780 --> 00:43:34,390
Speaker 2: I don't think that leaving the capital punishment off the

700
00:43:34,430 --> 00:43:39,509
Speaker 2: table was weakness. I think that lack of enforcement, you know,

701
00:43:39,550 --> 00:43:45,370
Speaker 2: if you're... I will tell you what I see as weakness, right?

702
00:43:48,030 --> 00:43:54,900
Speaker 2: We've had flare-ups with shenanigans at fraternity houses that have

703
00:43:54,920 --> 00:44:00,859
Speaker 2: resulted in, you know, sexual assaults. I think weakness is...

704
00:44:02,100 --> 00:44:06,720
Speaker 2: knowing it's happening, choosing not to participate, and also choosing

705
00:44:06,760 --> 00:44:10,900
Speaker 2: not to call anyone to stop it. Like that's weakness.

706
00:44:11,380 --> 00:44:13,770
Speaker 2: I think that's the sort of thing that fuels additional

707
00:44:14,250 --> 00:44:18,690
Speaker 2: bad acts. Whether or not a serial killer or a

708
00:44:18,710 --> 00:44:21,570
Speaker 2: mass murderer even thinks the way.

709
00:44:21,469 --> 00:44:25,209
Speaker 1: That we do about life in general is difficult to know.

710
00:44:26,450 --> 00:44:29,779
Speaker 2: But I think that if we The weakness comes in

711
00:44:30,219 --> 00:44:35,339
Speaker 2: knowing that there is something going wrong and deciding not

712
00:44:35,380 --> 00:44:40,279
Speaker 2: to do anything about it. I don't see that as

713
00:44:40,320 --> 00:44:45,110
Speaker 2: being mercy. I see that as being allowance. Allowance in

714
00:44:45,140 --> 00:44:50,810
Speaker 2: that case is weakness, not mercy. Mercy and judgment, and

715
00:44:50,850 --> 00:44:53,030
Speaker 2: maybe that's the way we should be phrasing this, Ashish.

716
00:44:53,210 --> 00:44:54,830
Speaker 2: Mercy in judgment.

717
00:44:57,450 --> 00:44:59,880
Speaker 1: Is not weakness. It's still judgment.

718
00:45:01,680 --> 00:45:04,370
Speaker 3: Good and right judgment. There's something merciful about it.

719
00:45:04,880 --> 00:45:05,100
Speaker 1: Yes.

720
00:45:05,500 --> 00:45:08,180
Speaker 3: And I suppose that the question here is whether capital

721
00:45:08,219 --> 00:45:11,980
Speaker 3: punishment fits within that. And to me, that sits outside

722
00:45:12,020 --> 00:45:15,660
Speaker 3: of it. To you, it mostly does, but there's a

723
00:45:15,680 --> 00:45:18,450
Speaker 3: really high bar to satisfy to say, well, we've reached

724
00:45:18,489 --> 00:45:18,890
Speaker 3: that point.

725
00:45:19,410 --> 00:45:20,730
Speaker 1: It is a really high bar for me.

726
00:45:20,790 --> 00:45:23,190
Speaker 2: And I don't know that I, I don't even know

727
00:45:23,230 --> 00:45:27,069
Speaker 2: where that bar would be reached for me. Um, but

728
00:45:27,120 --> 00:45:30,770
Speaker 2: I do think that, um, I don't think it's weakness

729
00:45:31,130 --> 00:45:31,930
Speaker 2: to have it off the table.

730
00:45:34,030 --> 00:45:35,230
Speaker 3: I'm going to appeal to Batman again.

731
00:45:36,350 --> 00:45:37,910
Speaker 1: That's good for me.

732
00:45:39,250 --> 00:45:44,549
Speaker 3: So Christopher Nolan actually addresses just this one in the

733
00:45:44,590 --> 00:45:48,550
Speaker 3: dark night, the famous dark night. So the setting here

734
00:45:48,700 --> 00:45:52,279
Speaker 3: is that in the first movie, uh, Falcone has been

735
00:45:52,320 --> 00:45:55,560
Speaker 3: taken down, uh, The mob is now on the run

736
00:45:55,620 --> 00:45:58,520
Speaker 3: in the second movie, The Dark Knight. The mob is

737
00:45:58,580 --> 00:46:04,430
Speaker 3: sufficiently terrified. And they're operating in, ironically, daytime instead of

738
00:46:04,469 --> 00:46:06,729
Speaker 3: nighttime because Batman's out at night and they're scared of him.

739
00:46:07,130 --> 00:46:10,790
Speaker 3: The cops are having success. The DA's office is having success.

740
00:46:12,010 --> 00:46:14,210
Speaker 3: And the streets of Gotham are actually being cleaned up.

741
00:46:14,230 --> 00:46:17,299
Speaker 3: Now here comes the Joker. And the Joker terrifies them

742
00:46:17,360 --> 00:46:23,120
Speaker 3: even more. And then there's a scene where Batman goes to... Oh,

743
00:46:23,160 --> 00:46:23,700
Speaker 3: what's his name?

744
00:46:24,320 --> 00:46:24,720
Speaker 2: Moroni.

745
00:46:24,760 --> 00:46:27,150
Speaker 3: He goes to Moroni, who's taken over as the head

746
00:46:27,190 --> 00:46:32,850
Speaker 3: honcho in Falcone's division of the mob. And Moroni says,

747
00:46:33,030 --> 00:46:35,190
Speaker 3: when Batman captures him and is threatening him, he says,

748
00:46:35,270 --> 00:46:38,450
Speaker 3: you don't scare me because everyone knows your gig is up.

749
00:46:38,610 --> 00:46:42,020
Speaker 3: You have a line. We're more scared, in other words,

750
00:46:42,080 --> 00:46:44,380
Speaker 3: of the Joker. He has no line. That dude's crazy.

751
00:46:46,760 --> 00:46:51,259
Speaker 3: And it's sort of a dare, right? In fact, it's

752
00:46:51,280 --> 00:46:55,339
Speaker 3: an extension of the Joker's dare. to really see what

753
00:46:55,400 --> 00:46:58,060
Speaker 3: is this line of batman's and initially he assumes batman's

754
00:46:58,120 --> 00:47:00,850
Speaker 3: line is just some sort of facile social thing of

755
00:47:01,030 --> 00:47:03,029
Speaker 3: we're the good guys we make the power so we're

756
00:47:03,050 --> 00:47:06,930
Speaker 3: good and you're the bad guys because we're the good

757
00:47:06,950 --> 00:47:12,510
Speaker 3: guys right entirely social entirely two-dimensional and the joker ultimately

758
00:47:12,570 --> 00:47:15,420
Speaker 3: becomes fascinated with batman because he realizes that's not who

759
00:47:15,460 --> 00:47:19,719
Speaker 3: batman is batman is in many ways like himself but

760
00:47:19,780 --> 00:47:22,410
Speaker 3: sort of the polar opposite so i've i I've been

761
00:47:22,469 --> 00:47:25,500
Speaker 3: inclined to refer to this as the difference between Nietzsche's

762
00:47:25,540 --> 00:47:28,259
Speaker 3: Madman and Kierkegaard's The Night of Faith. It's sort of

763
00:47:28,300 --> 00:47:30,460
Speaker 3: what seems to be at play there. That's his own

764
00:47:30,500 --> 00:47:35,739
Speaker 3: time and place. But I just think it's fascinating that

765
00:47:35,800 --> 00:47:40,610
Speaker 3: for the mob, the recognition of Batman having a line

766
00:47:40,770 --> 00:47:42,770
Speaker 3: is a sign of his weakness. And that does seem

767
00:47:42,810 --> 00:47:46,009
Speaker 3: to be what Nolan takes up as a theme for

768
00:47:46,050 --> 00:47:50,580
Speaker 3: that movie. To question... how Batman can overcome someone who

769
00:47:50,620 --> 00:47:52,960
Speaker 3: has no line when he does have lines. Is it

770
00:47:53,000 --> 00:47:56,799
Speaker 3: in fact his weakness? Is that ultimately his weakness? And

771
00:47:56,820 --> 00:47:59,920
Speaker 3: the answer in the movie ultimately is no, but it's

772
00:48:00,000 --> 00:48:03,520
Speaker 3: interesting to me how it's no, because the thing that

773
00:48:03,620 --> 00:48:07,890
Speaker 3: finally overcomes it is deeply Christological. It's that he takes

774
00:48:07,950 --> 00:48:14,669
Speaker 3: everything upon himself. He becomes the sacrificial goat as the symbol.

775
00:48:14,870 --> 00:48:17,210
Speaker 3: He enables himself to take the blame in order to

776
00:48:18,390 --> 00:48:21,320
Speaker 3: allow the cops the space to be able to clean

777
00:48:21,380 --> 00:48:27,620
Speaker 3: up the crimes. And I want to say that this

778
00:48:27,660 --> 00:48:31,080
Speaker 3: Christopher Nolan Batman logic is less Christopher Nolan Batman logic,

779
00:48:31,180 --> 00:48:34,240
Speaker 3: wherever he thinks he's getting it from, and it's more

780
00:48:34,719 --> 00:48:39,810
Speaker 3: Christological logic. So to me, when I reject that sort

781
00:48:39,850 --> 00:48:46,660
Speaker 3: of claim that there's a line here, that's making for

782
00:48:46,700 --> 00:48:49,440
Speaker 3: weakness that's not deterring these other folks I don't know

783
00:48:49,460 --> 00:48:53,140
Speaker 3: that there is a line that would deter folks that

784
00:48:53,180 --> 00:48:55,379
Speaker 3: are so you know those are very much like what

785
00:48:55,560 --> 00:48:58,130
Speaker 3: Alfred describes the Joker some people just want to watch.

786
00:48:58,010 --> 00:49:00,350
Speaker 1: The world burn and those sorts of folks just.

787
00:49:00,330 --> 00:49:03,070
Speaker 3: Want to watch the world burn I think that's right

788
00:49:04,290 --> 00:49:05,870
Speaker 3: it's not right that they are that way and that

789
00:49:06,290 --> 00:49:09,569
Speaker 3: whatever's gone on within them there's some deep problems but

790
00:49:09,590 --> 00:49:12,730
Speaker 3: it's right that that diagnosis of the situation is correct

791
00:49:13,670 --> 00:49:17,480
Speaker 3: yeah And having a line doesn't cause for weakness and

792
00:49:17,500 --> 00:49:22,000
Speaker 3: it doesn't change the the line was already there and

793
00:49:22,020 --> 00:49:23,900
Speaker 3: these people were where they were and the people who

794
00:49:23,940 --> 00:49:27,180
Speaker 3: continue that way are who they are but to me

795
00:49:27,219 --> 00:49:30,960
Speaker 3: what's interesting is that ultimately the way god deals with

796
00:49:30,980 --> 00:49:35,000
Speaker 3: that is not even those situations where god has chosen

797
00:49:35,120 --> 00:49:38,080
Speaker 3: to say, okay, now you dropped it. The Ananias and

798
00:49:38,100 --> 00:49:40,910
Speaker 3: Sapphira situation. The ultimate way in which God chose to

799
00:49:40,950 --> 00:49:43,770
Speaker 3: deal with it is to recognize, to have us recognize

800
00:49:43,830 --> 00:49:49,350
Speaker 3: that the line between a murderer and someone who hates

801
00:49:49,810 --> 00:49:52,570
Speaker 3: in his or her heart on one level is a

802
00:49:52,630 --> 00:49:59,160
Speaker 3: real line of difference. But on another level still shows

803
00:49:59,219 --> 00:50:03,640
Speaker 3: that we all ultimately need judgment and And we all

804
00:50:03,660 --> 00:50:06,680
Speaker 3: need mercy to overcome that judgment. And so the judgment

805
00:50:06,719 --> 00:50:10,219
Speaker 3: happens in, again, the God's giving of God's self in

806
00:50:10,239 --> 00:50:14,799
Speaker 3: the Son on the cross, right? So to me, that's

807
00:50:14,820 --> 00:50:16,899
Speaker 3: not a weakness at all. It's a recognition of just

808
00:50:16,940 --> 00:50:18,839
Speaker 3: how much more important it is for all of us

809
00:50:20,260 --> 00:50:21,770
Speaker 3: that God takes it upon God's self.

810
00:50:21,790 --> 00:50:25,430
Speaker 2: Well, and this definitely gets into what I would say

811
00:50:25,550 --> 00:50:28,649
Speaker 2: is the sort of false eschatologies that are often put

812
00:50:28,790 --> 00:50:31,210
Speaker 2: out in our national narratives.

813
00:50:32,050 --> 00:50:32,270
Speaker 1: Right?

814
00:50:32,489 --> 00:50:35,250
Speaker 2: As if we have, as if we can project progress,

815
00:50:35,830 --> 00:50:38,390
Speaker 2: as if we know where we're going. It sort of

816
00:50:38,430 --> 00:50:43,650
Speaker 2: speaks to the hubris of humanity more generally and of

817
00:50:43,750 --> 00:50:46,990
Speaker 2: any given nation in particular. And so when we're talking

818
00:50:47,030 --> 00:50:50,640
Speaker 2: about some of these ideas of where's our line and

819
00:50:50,700 --> 00:50:54,340
Speaker 2: can I act Christologically to the extent that anyone in

820
00:50:54,440 --> 00:51:00,080
Speaker 2: our government would understand what that means, right? They're also

821
00:51:00,140 --> 00:51:04,529
Speaker 2: trying to factor in How do I sustain toward a

822
00:51:05,670 --> 00:51:11,210
Speaker 2: desired future, right? And what way can I make this

823
00:51:11,290 --> 00:51:16,489
Speaker 2: judgment for that future? I think what you're hitting on

824
00:51:16,530 --> 00:51:19,120
Speaker 2: there with the Batman analogy, and I think you're right

825
00:51:19,140 --> 00:51:24,279
Speaker 2: about the sort of Christological undertones of that piece, there

826
00:51:24,400 --> 00:51:27,600
Speaker 2: is a different logic that Christians get to use because

827
00:51:27,640 --> 00:51:31,589
Speaker 2: we understand the end. We understand where we're going. We

828
00:51:31,650 --> 00:51:35,270
Speaker 2: see God enact justice. We see it all fixed. We

829
00:51:35,310 --> 00:51:39,670
Speaker 2: see it all restored. We know that's coming. And we

830
00:51:39,750 --> 00:51:43,379
Speaker 2: also know that the way to win is not to

831
00:51:43,489 --> 00:51:50,700
Speaker 2: overpower or to take over, but to suffer long, right?

832
00:51:51,280 --> 00:51:56,880
Speaker 2: He who overcomes in Revelation is almost always connected to

833
00:51:56,960 --> 00:52:03,160
Speaker 2: the idea that we live within difficult circumstances, suffering without compromise.

834
00:52:04,900 --> 00:52:09,790
Speaker 2: And that sort of overcoming involves deep patience, deep hope,

835
00:52:09,950 --> 00:52:15,270
Speaker 2: deep long-suffering, all these kind of ideas. Our issue is,

836
00:52:15,290 --> 00:52:19,660
Speaker 2: you know, can a government sort of sit back and say,

837
00:52:19,680 --> 00:52:24,440
Speaker 2: I understand the Christological act that I'm enacting here, even

838
00:52:24,540 --> 00:52:29,469
Speaker 2: on some sort of nascent level. And show that mercy

839
00:52:30,469 --> 00:52:34,550
Speaker 2: even in the face of some sort of national crisis.

840
00:52:35,790 --> 00:52:39,620
Speaker 1: I think back about Pharaoh, right? The Pharaoh who knew

841
00:52:39,640 --> 00:52:40,300
Speaker 1: not Joseph.

842
00:52:40,800 --> 00:52:43,779
Speaker 2: And he's looking out at his slave population growing like,

843
00:52:44,340 --> 00:52:47,340
Speaker 2: you know, weeds and saying, this can't be good.

844
00:52:48,719 --> 00:52:49,819
Speaker 1: But in fact, it is good.

845
00:52:51,140 --> 00:52:54,690
Speaker 2: He just can't recognize it as such. It's God's blessing

846
00:52:54,730 --> 00:52:57,650
Speaker 2: being worked out. This is not a danger to Pharaoh.

847
00:52:58,610 --> 00:53:04,530
Speaker 2: This is a blessing to all mankind that now Pharaoh

848
00:53:04,630 --> 00:53:08,410
Speaker 2: engages himself in stopping. And I think that the same

849
00:53:08,489 --> 00:53:10,310
Speaker 2: case could be made for the sort of judgment that

850
00:53:10,350 --> 00:53:14,450
Speaker 2: the nations have now. And again, I feel like I'm

851
00:53:14,530 --> 00:53:21,750
Speaker 2: arguing your point. But I think part of what I

852
00:53:21,850 --> 00:53:24,290
Speaker 2: still have difficulty getting around and what I'd want to

853
00:53:24,330 --> 00:53:24,830
Speaker 2: hold out is.

854
00:53:27,700 --> 00:53:30,610
Speaker 2: There is something sacred about human life that needs to

855
00:53:30,670 --> 00:53:33,770
Speaker 2: be deeply respected. And I know you don't disagree with that.

856
00:53:34,950 --> 00:53:37,750
Speaker 2: But I think that that Genesis 9, 6, maybe it's

857
00:53:37,770 --> 00:53:40,210
Speaker 2: just my traditional way of reading it. You know, I've

858
00:53:40,250 --> 00:53:41,890
Speaker 2: heard it too many times for it just to get

859
00:53:41,950 --> 00:53:45,380
Speaker 2: out of my head. But I think it still does

860
00:53:45,469 --> 00:53:50,520
Speaker 2: hold to a certain degree because of those perpetual elements

861
00:53:50,660 --> 00:53:52,739
Speaker 2: of the image of God and the blood. I think

862
00:53:52,820 --> 00:53:57,140
Speaker 2: that capital punishment has to still be on the table.

863
00:53:58,110 --> 00:54:01,670
Speaker 2: But I agree with you. And I think ultimately, practically,

864
00:54:01,989 --> 00:54:04,830
Speaker 2: would I ever say, yes, I think that's an appropriate

865
00:54:04,870 --> 00:54:07,569
Speaker 2: judgment to make. I think it's a judgment that's not

866
00:54:07,590 --> 00:54:10,640
Speaker 2: going to come back to haunt someone. I'm not sure

867
00:54:10,700 --> 00:54:14,620
Speaker 2: I get there. But I think just in principle, in

868
00:54:14,640 --> 00:54:16,340
Speaker 2: the reading of the text, I don't know that I

869
00:54:16,400 --> 00:54:21,350
Speaker 2: want to eliminate it. But I do think that as Christians,

870
00:54:22,410 --> 00:54:25,750
Speaker 2: when we're advocating for certain things like this, when we're

871
00:54:26,260 --> 00:54:32,700
Speaker 2: vehemently for let's say the death penalty. I have difficulty

872
00:54:32,739 --> 00:54:36,370
Speaker 2: with that too. And I have difficulty with it for

873
00:54:36,469 --> 00:54:38,470
Speaker 2: all the reasons that we've talked about on this episode.

874
00:54:39,010 --> 00:54:41,150
Speaker 2: And I have difficulty with it because I think that

875
00:54:41,190 --> 00:54:49,160
Speaker 2: it speaks to a capture by an imagination that, uh, reckons.

876
00:54:48,760 --> 00:54:50,720
Speaker 1: The world in a way other than Christ.

877
00:54:52,660 --> 00:54:57,910
Speaker 2: I don't think that Christological, um, dynamic that you described

878
00:54:57,950 --> 00:55:09,989
Speaker 2: so well is commensurate with a vehement, uh, endorsement of

879
00:55:10,030 --> 00:55:11,530
Speaker 2: capital punishment in today's world.

880
00:55:12,910 --> 00:55:13,710
Speaker 1: I just don't see that.

881
00:55:13,730 --> 00:55:17,560
Speaker 2: And, and, and so I'm sure we can agree on that,

882
00:55:17,600 --> 00:55:20,280
Speaker 2: even if we can't agree to, you know, like on that.

883
00:55:20,200 --> 00:55:21,480
Speaker 1: Other, on that other level.

884
00:55:22,280 --> 00:55:25,340
Speaker 2: But I think that's sort of where I come down

885
00:55:25,360 --> 00:55:28,640
Speaker 2: on it. I think there is a Christian logic that

886
00:55:28,760 --> 00:55:33,190
Speaker 2: should be guiding us that says the death penalty is

887
00:55:33,210 --> 00:55:34,549
Speaker 2: an end.

888
00:55:36,489 --> 00:55:39,430
Speaker 1: And do I really believe, yes.

889
00:55:39,450 --> 00:55:45,850
Speaker 2: These governing authorities are instituted by God, but do I

890
00:55:45,950 --> 00:55:49,570
Speaker 2: really want them deciding this sort of end for someone?

891
00:55:51,280 --> 00:55:52,299
Speaker 1: I'm not sure I do.

892
00:55:55,640 --> 00:55:58,900
Speaker 3: Yeah, which is one of the things that I think

893
00:55:58,940 --> 00:56:02,080
Speaker 3: I said earlier as part of my hard line. But

894
00:56:02,680 --> 00:56:04,859
Speaker 3: since you've spent so much time making my case for me,

895
00:56:04,880 --> 00:56:10,040
Speaker 3: I want to pull a little bit back and make

896
00:56:10,160 --> 00:56:12,359
Speaker 3: part of a case for you. Because I think the

897
00:56:12,440 --> 00:56:17,900
Speaker 3: one part, the two situations that we just went through,

898
00:56:18,460 --> 00:56:24,239
Speaker 3: I've heard it said. Mm-hmm. don't particularly work to sway me,

899
00:56:24,900 --> 00:56:28,120
Speaker 3: but the one that might sway me is the Bonhoeffer

900
00:56:28,160 --> 00:56:33,140
Speaker 3: Hitler case. So you and I both like Stanley Hauerwas.

901
00:56:33,739 --> 00:56:33,890
Speaker 1: Yeah.

902
00:56:33,930 --> 00:56:40,010
Speaker 3: Hauerwas really liked Bonhoeffer, but Stanley Hauerwas believes that Bonhoeffer

903
00:56:40,690 --> 00:56:45,069
Speaker 3: violated his own conscience and was inconsistent with himself in

904
00:56:45,090 --> 00:56:49,549
Speaker 3: choosing to be part of the plot to assassinate Hitler. Yeah. Um,

905
00:56:50,239 --> 00:56:52,540
Speaker 3: I'm not interested in debating whether he's right or wrong

906
00:56:52,580 --> 00:56:55,610
Speaker 3: about Bonhoeffer. But when I want to think about... I

907
00:56:58,050 --> 00:57:02,250
Speaker 3: guess for Hauerwas, it's a really hard line. Even the

908
00:57:02,290 --> 00:57:07,350
Speaker 3: Hitler occasion is not an occasion to take up arms

909
00:57:07,890 --> 00:57:13,860
Speaker 3: or to kill. And as close as I've sounded to Hauerwas'

910
00:57:13,920 --> 00:57:16,560
Speaker 3: position so far, the Hitler line is a tough one

911
00:57:16,620 --> 00:57:19,140
Speaker 3: for me. I'm not sure that I can quite go

912
00:57:19,220 --> 00:57:26,590
Speaker 3: over to Hauerwas' side. Because I think about all of

913
00:57:26,650 --> 00:57:32,570
Speaker 3: the people... This isn't just pressing a button to defend people.

914
00:57:32,630 --> 00:57:35,610
Speaker 3: This is Bonhoeffer putting his very body, and those in

915
00:57:35,650 --> 00:57:38,130
Speaker 3: his organization. We often laud Bonhoeffer, but it was a

916
00:57:38,150 --> 00:57:42,220
Speaker 3: group of people. Yeah. who put their own lives between,

917
00:57:42,760 --> 00:57:45,380
Speaker 3: they consciously put their lives between the people that they

918
00:57:45,400 --> 00:57:49,620
Speaker 3: were seeking to stand up for and Hitler and his regime,

919
00:57:50,860 --> 00:57:53,220
Speaker 3: which put his own life at risk, which to me

920
00:57:53,280 --> 00:57:59,370
Speaker 3: sounds actually very Christological. Of course, the difference is, unlike Jesus,

921
00:57:59,770 --> 00:58:02,030
Speaker 3: it was an active effort not just to stand between,

922
00:58:02,050 --> 00:58:05,370
Speaker 3: but to try to take Hitler's life. But I have

923
00:58:05,390 --> 00:58:09,860
Speaker 3: a hard time blaming Bonhoeffer for that. But the trouble

924
00:58:09,900 --> 00:58:12,280
Speaker 3: with me of making a rule out of that is

925
00:58:15,280 --> 00:58:17,600
Speaker 3: how do I know when I'm in that situation? It's

926
00:58:17,640 --> 00:58:22,700
Speaker 3: a lot easier 80 plus years after Hitler to recognize

927
00:58:22,740 --> 00:58:27,400
Speaker 3: that's who Hitler was. But in the moment would I

928
00:58:27,400 --> 00:58:30,260
Speaker 3: have recognized it? In the moment what would I have said?

929
00:58:30,280 --> 00:58:33,340
Speaker 3: And how do I know if such a person's around now?

930
00:58:33,380 --> 00:58:36,380
Speaker 3: There's certainly people who've been compared to Hitler. And I

931
00:58:36,420 --> 00:58:39,930
Speaker 3: don't know to what degree that Those comparisons are good

932
00:58:39,970 --> 00:58:43,110
Speaker 3: or bad, accurate or inaccurate, because I wasn't there, right?

933
00:58:43,130 --> 00:58:46,950
Speaker 3: All I have is the textbook depiction of Hitler, that

934
00:58:46,990 --> 00:58:49,689
Speaker 3: an actual acquaintance with him might have actually made things

935
00:58:49,790 --> 00:58:55,910
Speaker 3: more complicated. But I do, from this 80-plus year angle

936
00:58:56,050 --> 00:59:00,070
Speaker 3: after the fact, want to say... We even have Bart

937
00:59:00,110 --> 00:59:03,850
Speaker 3: that we went through, right? His letter where he was even.

938
00:59:05,620 --> 00:59:08,170
Speaker 3: To the degree that he was far less compelled that

939
00:59:08,190 --> 00:59:10,670
Speaker 3: World War I needed to happen, he was. had no

940
00:59:10,730 --> 00:59:13,770
Speaker 3: problem saying World War II needed to happen without being

941
00:59:13,790 --> 00:59:17,330
Speaker 3: a warmonger, right? So is there that sort of situation?

942
00:59:18,360 --> 00:59:21,300
Speaker 3: I'm not sure that I'm willing to quite enter that

943
00:59:21,490 --> 00:59:26,680
Speaker 3: absolute territory of a Hauerwas and this sort of a scenario,

944
00:59:26,840 --> 00:59:28,760
Speaker 3: even if I'm not sure that I would recognize that

945
00:59:28,800 --> 00:59:30,790
Speaker 3: situation when I'm in it. Yeah.

946
00:59:30,810 --> 00:59:32,530
Speaker 1: And I think that's the real problem there.

947
00:59:32,690 --> 00:59:37,000
Speaker 2: She's like, I, I think Bart's righteous kingdom, you know,

948
00:59:37,040 --> 00:59:39,600
Speaker 2: sort of acting along or acting in concert with the

949
00:59:39,660 --> 00:59:42,280
Speaker 2: righteous kingdom in any given moment, that way that he

950
00:59:42,380 --> 00:59:44,580
Speaker 2: does that in his letter to the American church that

951
00:59:44,600 --> 00:59:50,610
Speaker 2: we went through. I think the difficulty with ever making

952
00:59:50,650 --> 00:59:53,190
Speaker 2: that claim is that you've got to recognize when you're

953
00:59:53,210 --> 00:59:59,400
Speaker 2: doing it, you know? And, and, And for Barth, that

954
00:59:59,500 --> 01:00:06,640
Speaker 2: is a very sort of peculiar, not peculiar, it's very specific.

955
01:00:07,420 --> 01:00:11,800
Speaker 2: You can be acting as an emissary of the righteous

956
01:00:11,840 --> 01:00:15,750
Speaker 2: kingdom by doing one thing and not by another. And

957
01:00:15,830 --> 01:00:18,450
Speaker 2: so there's not this sort of clean alignment. You're always

958
01:00:18,470 --> 01:00:20,530
Speaker 2: with the righteous kingdom or you're not with the righteous kingdom.

959
01:00:21,050 --> 01:00:23,930
Speaker 2: It can take on these little pieces and sparks. And

960
01:00:23,950 --> 01:00:27,090
Speaker 2: so I think noticing which one you're doing at any

961
01:00:27,130 --> 01:00:33,800
Speaker 2: given moment is really difficult. That said, he does go

962
01:00:33,860 --> 01:00:37,420
Speaker 2: all the way and say, this war needs to be fought.

963
01:00:38,040 --> 01:00:39,880
Speaker 1: This guy needs to be taken down.

964
01:00:41,600 --> 01:00:45,260
Speaker 2: And so I think that that's sort of the part

965
01:00:45,460 --> 01:00:50,140
Speaker 2: that I do want to preserve for those in leadership

966
01:00:50,900 --> 01:00:54,920
Speaker 2: is to be able to make those calls out. do

967
01:00:54,980 --> 01:00:57,700
Speaker 2: I think that those calls are easy to make or that,

968
01:00:57,890 --> 01:01:00,930
Speaker 2: you know, the people in charge are particularly well suited

969
01:01:00,990 --> 01:01:04,950
Speaker 2: to make them? Those are different questions. And that's where

970
01:01:05,010 --> 01:01:11,350
Speaker 2: I think, yeah, that's where I think that this notion of, yes,

971
01:01:11,390 --> 01:01:13,890
Speaker 2: let's preserve that power in the hopes that we have

972
01:01:13,950 --> 01:01:17,210
Speaker 2: people of sufficient character who will actually make the right decision.

973
01:01:18,090 --> 01:01:21,510
Speaker 2: That's a very different call in World War II than

974
01:01:21,550 --> 01:01:24,470
Speaker 2: it is in, many of the worst we've fought since,

975
01:01:24,550 --> 01:01:25,120
Speaker 2: for instance.

976
01:01:27,050 --> 01:01:30,770
Speaker 1: And yet we preserve that power. I don't know what

977
01:01:30,810 --> 01:01:31,630
Speaker 1: to do with that.

978
01:01:33,290 --> 01:01:38,270
Speaker 2: But I also don't want our leaders to be constrained

979
01:01:38,350 --> 01:01:42,590
Speaker 2: from fighting World War II. And I think on parallel,

980
01:01:42,700 --> 01:01:45,220
Speaker 2: when we're looking at capital punishment, that's sort of where

981
01:01:45,280 --> 01:01:50,600
Speaker 2: it sits for me. It's an almost impossible decision to

982
01:01:50,640 --> 01:01:58,660
Speaker 2: make by people who probably are not fit to make it. Um,

983
01:01:58,700 --> 01:02:01,570
Speaker 2: not that I'm saying I would be, um, but I

984
01:02:01,610 --> 01:02:03,940
Speaker 2: think people in general are not fit to make it.

985
01:02:05,930 --> 01:02:11,730
Speaker 2: That has tremendous consequences when we're wrong and tremendous consequences

986
01:02:11,770 --> 01:02:16,070
Speaker 2: when we're right. And so I think it's sort of

987
01:02:16,150 --> 01:02:18,990
Speaker 2: one of those things where we can't be flipping about it.

988
01:02:19,760 --> 01:02:21,520
Speaker 1: We can't even be cautious about it.

989
01:02:22,640 --> 01:02:24,820
Speaker 2: We need to, and this is something I brought out

990
01:02:24,860 --> 01:02:28,300
Speaker 2: last episode when we were talking about the live streaming

991
01:02:28,360 --> 01:02:31,220
Speaker 2: of it, it needs to be given its due weight.

992
01:02:32,780 --> 01:02:34,740
Speaker 2: And what I would say is that sucker is heavy.

993
01:02:37,900 --> 01:02:45,180
Speaker 2: It's the 1,500-pound deadlift that nobody can really do. That's

994
01:02:45,200 --> 01:02:49,720
Speaker 2: what I think it has to be given its due weight. Right.

995
01:02:49,840 --> 01:02:52,180
Speaker 3: And I guess the interesting thing about this element that

996
01:02:53,500 --> 01:02:57,290
Speaker 3: that maybe shows the crack in my willingness to go

997
01:02:57,330 --> 01:03:01,510
Speaker 3: into the absolute line is when we look at the

998
01:03:01,550 --> 01:03:06,570
Speaker 3: example of world war two, almost every enactment or telling

999
01:03:06,610 --> 01:03:09,230
Speaker 3: of that story revolves around Hitler and the Nazi party.

1000
01:03:11,600 --> 01:03:15,000
Speaker 3: But there were other characters. There was fascist Italy with Mussolini.

1001
01:03:15,040 --> 01:03:18,160
Speaker 3: There was Imperial Japan with emperor whose name.

1002
01:03:18,040 --> 01:03:18,600
Speaker 1: I don't remember.

1003
01:03:20,300 --> 01:03:23,680
Speaker 3: What if we, you know, Completely impossible to ask. What

1004
01:03:23,860 --> 01:03:25,900
Speaker 3: if we took Hitler and the Nazis out of that?

1005
01:03:25,960 --> 01:03:35,120
Speaker 3: They don't exist. Was Mussolini's Italy and Imperial Japan enough

1006
01:03:35,160 --> 01:03:37,080
Speaker 3: of a reason to have World War II?

1007
01:03:38,740 --> 01:03:40,200
Speaker 1: It's suddenly really interesting.

1008
01:03:40,340 --> 01:03:43,100
Speaker 3: And that's the trouble that I have with. How do

1009
01:03:43,160 --> 01:03:47,680
Speaker 3: I recognize the line? Once we're at what Hitler was doing,

1010
01:03:47,720 --> 01:03:49,980
Speaker 3: it's really easy 80 plus years later to look at

1011
01:03:50,000 --> 01:03:54,230
Speaker 3: that and say, okay, that was the one That made

1012
01:03:54,430 --> 01:03:57,990
Speaker 3: it apparent. But never mind even on the national level.

1013
01:03:58,070 --> 01:03:59,730
Speaker 3: Now I'm going to take that logic and I'm going

1014
01:03:59,750 --> 01:04:04,530
Speaker 3: to apply it to individual citizens within a nation state.

1015
01:04:05,390 --> 01:04:08,280
Speaker 3: To me, that's where I find myself sounding a lot

1016
01:04:08,360 --> 01:04:12,420
Speaker 3: like Stanley Hauerwas, even as I know that there's a

1017
01:04:12,480 --> 01:04:13,160
Speaker 3: point at which I.

1018
01:04:13,160 --> 01:04:16,810
Speaker 1: Don't follow him. Right. And I think it is a....

1019
01:04:21,900 --> 01:04:24,100
Speaker 2: I think I tend to agree with that position. I

1020
01:04:24,240 --> 01:04:26,680
Speaker 2: think we've almost argued closer than we were before we

1021
01:04:26,720 --> 01:04:31,140
Speaker 2: started this would be my guess. Didn't really mean to,

1022
01:04:31,220 --> 01:04:34,350
Speaker 2: but I think we have because I, you know, I agree.

1023
01:04:34,410 --> 01:04:38,470
Speaker 2: I think, you know, after the conversation, you sit back

1024
01:04:38,530 --> 01:04:41,190
Speaker 2: and you just say, who makes this decision?

1025
01:04:41,790 --> 01:04:42,730
Speaker 1: Who makes this call?

1026
01:04:44,470 --> 01:04:49,310
Speaker 2: And why is it that they wouldn't show mercy? And

1027
01:04:50,100 --> 01:04:53,890
Speaker 2: I think if we view God's laws, as we've talked

1028
01:04:53,930 --> 01:04:59,370
Speaker 2: about in this episode, as having an undertone of mercy,

1029
01:04:59,450 --> 01:05:03,430
Speaker 2: having this sort of love your neighbor as yourself, not

1030
01:05:03,690 --> 01:05:07,570
Speaker 2: no judgment, but mercy and judgment. What does that look like?

1031
01:05:07,720 --> 01:05:11,140
Speaker 2: How does that play itself out? Well, it certainly doesn't

1032
01:05:11,180 --> 01:05:14,680
Speaker 2: begin with, if you kill someone, you get the death penalty.

1033
01:05:14,780 --> 01:05:17,500
Speaker 1: No ifs, ands, or buts about it. Right?

1034
01:05:17,920 --> 01:05:22,140
Speaker 2: It's not that sort of rigid. line drawn that you

1035
01:05:22,240 --> 01:05:26,240
Speaker 2: often hear in these kind of discussions, right?

1036
01:05:26,600 --> 01:05:29,570
Speaker 1: God commanded it, so we do it. I don't think

1037
01:05:29,610 --> 01:05:30,390
Speaker 1: it's that line.

1038
01:05:31,690 --> 01:05:34,050
Speaker 2: And if it's not that straight line through to it,

1039
01:05:35,670 --> 01:05:42,560
Speaker 2: I think that the deliberations are sufficiently crippling such that

1040
01:05:43,040 --> 01:05:45,120
Speaker 2: you would almost never get to the point where you

1041
01:05:45,160 --> 01:05:45,860
Speaker 2: decide to do it.

1042
01:05:49,490 --> 01:05:53,400
Speaker 3: Maybe that's okay, except we have that Hitler clause.

1043
01:05:54,220 --> 01:05:56,120
Speaker 1: Yeah.

1044
01:05:56,580 --> 01:06:01,740
Speaker 2: But we have a nuclear button rebushed somewhere or a

1045
01:06:02,100 --> 01:06:03,080
Speaker 2: pause button on it.

1046
01:06:03,240 --> 01:06:03,700
Speaker 1: I don't know.

1047
01:06:04,120 --> 01:06:07,680
Speaker 2: But it's good to talk this through. And I hope

1048
01:06:07,720 --> 01:06:10,740
Speaker 2: what people are hearing from us is it really is

1049
01:06:10,780 --> 01:06:13,400
Speaker 2: a weighty issue. This isn't something flippant. And I don't

1050
01:06:13,440 --> 01:06:15,600
Speaker 2: even think I agree with you. I don't think that

1051
01:06:15,640 --> 01:06:18,360
Speaker 2: these statements in the Old Testament are intended to mean

1052
01:06:19,370 --> 01:06:22,780
Speaker 2: in the first instance or, you know, in every instance

1053
01:06:22,840 --> 01:06:27,040
Speaker 2: this happens, this has to occur. I think there is

1054
01:06:27,140 --> 01:06:31,800
Speaker 2: some level of flexibility there, not so that we can

1055
01:06:33,200 --> 01:06:37,700
Speaker 2: serve ourselves, but so that we can love as God

1056
01:06:37,780 --> 01:06:41,470
Speaker 2: loves and show mercy as God shows mercy. And so

1057
01:06:42,210 --> 01:06:44,350
Speaker 2: hopefully that's when people are taken away from this. And

1058
01:06:45,110 --> 01:06:45,950
Speaker 2: if they're not, there should be.

1059
01:06:46,850 --> 01:06:47,390
Speaker 1: So, yeah.

1060
01:06:48,110 --> 01:06:49,750
Speaker 3: And we better stop before we fully agree.

1061
01:06:49,770 --> 01:06:51,030
Speaker 1: Yeah, exactly.

1062
01:06:52,110 --> 01:06:54,140
Speaker 2: We can both agree to stop the program right now.

1063
01:06:54,390 --> 01:06:57,680
Speaker 2: So we'll do that. Thanks, everybody, for listening. Thanks, Ashish,

1064
01:06:57,700 --> 01:07:00,260
Speaker 2: for the conversation. We'll catch you on the next episode

1065
01:07:00,280 --> 01:07:01,000
Speaker 2: of Thinking Christian.

1066
01:07:01,160 --> 01:07:01,520
Speaker 1: Take care.

1067
01:07:01,960 --> 01:07:03,439
Speaker 2: Just want to take a second to thank the team

1068
01:07:03,500 --> 01:07:05,880
Speaker 2: at Life Audio for their partnership with us on the

1069
01:07:05,920 --> 01:07:09,520
Speaker 2: Thinking Christian podcast. If you go to lifeaudio.com, you'll find

1070
01:07:09,600 --> 01:07:12,990
Speaker 2: dozens of other faith-centered podcasts in their network. They've got

1071
01:07:13,010 --> 01:07:15,850
Speaker 2: shows about prayer, Bible study, parenting, and more.