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Who Was the Evilest Person Who’s Ever Lived?

If someone asked you that question, I expect you might answer with a dictator with a body count in the millions, like Hitler, Stalin, or Mao. Or you might reply with a serial killer with a much lower body-count, but much more sadistic and agonizing means of execution. (And if you answer with Donald Trump, I really question your priorities and urge you to do a little more reading up on those others and a lot less time listening to propagandists who use those same dictators’ methods to silence dissent).

But, since Halloween is a time for reflection on good versus evil, I will give you what I think the Biblical answer to the evilest person in history was. The choice might surprise you. In fact, in contrast to all the mass-murderers and tyrants in history, this person only has a body count of one. I speak of Judas Iscariot.

The Bible doesn’t spend a whole lot of ink going into Judas and what made him tick. Unlike our modern crime shows and documentaries, we don’t get a psychoanalysis of Judas and why he did what he did. What it does say, however, is chilling enough. Judas was called to be one of Jesus’s Twelve Apostles, a disciple who followed him and attended on him throughout his ministry in return for receiving his teaching. We do know that Judas spent a lot of his time with Jesus pilfering the money box. In the end, he is best known for betraying Jesus and leading the detachment of troops who went to arrest him in a place Judas knew Jesus would be at without a crowd to interfere. The priests intended to get their hands on Jesus to execute him, which they did the following morning. For this, he agreed to receive the measly reward of thirty pieces of silver.

Now, don’t get me wrong. All those dictators and serial-killers are going to suffer unspeakable torments in Hell for all eternity, for they were in fact especially evil. But if we look at Biblical categories of evil, one of the most important factors is how much a sin is a sin against knowledge. Consider what Jesus says to Capernaum in Matthew 11:24, in a statement that should make every Western skeptic tremble, “But I say unto you, that it shall be more tolerable for the land of Sodom in the day of judgment than for thee.”

Let that sink in. The Bible pronounces horrible condemnations on Sodom. In Genesis 19, its entire male population comes out to storm Lot’s house and gang-rape his angelic guests. This crime would have struck the Old Testament listeners even more harshly than it does us since the code of hospitality was so much more sacrosanct to them. Sodom is so evil God wipes it off the map with literal fire and brimstone. There is not one hint of such blatant sinning on Capernaum’s part. Indeed, they welcomed Jesus and crowded around to hear his teaching. What was their sin? They heard Jesus, but “they repented not” (Matthew 11:21).

One of the most important factors is how much a sin is a sin against knowledge.

Capernaum had a revelation Sodom did not. Sodom had Abraham’s and Lot’s righteous examples, but here were people listening at the feet of the Son of God, seeing his miracles performed. Sodom never heard the Ten Commandments or the Sermon on the Mount, but the people of Capernaum did. They marveled at Jesus, discussed the words and works for a few days amongst themselves, and then went right back to their business. Jesus said this indifference to him was worse than homosexual gang rape.

He states it even more clearly in Luke 12:47-48: “And that servant which knew his Lord’s will and prepared not himself, neither did according to his will, shall be beaten with many stripes. But he that knew not and did commit things worthy of stripes, shall be beaten with few stripes.” This key component of knowledge is why Paul goes to such great lengths in Romans 1-3 to show that everyone has a knowledge of God and his law written on their hearts and are therefore guilty whenever they sin. That would be the Sodomites. But those who have been exposed to greater degrees of truth than this are even more accountable when they sin. Or, as Uncle Ben might have put it, “With great revelation comes great responsibility.”

Has anyone else sinned against knowledge to the extent of Judas Iscariot? He followed Jesus for three years and heard practically all his teaching. He saw the miracles Jesus wrought and the extent of his compassion towards everyone. He heard the words Jesus spoke that are not recorded in the Gospels and the “many other signs truly [that Jesus did] in the presence of his disciples” that John didn’t have space to record (John 20:30). Jesus gave him power to do miracles in his name. Had he proven faithful, he had held before him the promise of being “appoint[ed] unto a kingdom” with Jesus, sitting on a throne and “judging the Twelve Tribes of Israel” (Luke 22:29-30). Judas had greater revelation and privilege than any of us alive today. He admitted that he himself knew Jesus was innocent. Yet, he chose to deliver him over to death. And, not that any price would have justified his actions, but the cheap bribe he took for his betrayal was downright insulting to Jesus.

Has anyone else sinned against knowledge to the extent of Judas Iscariot?

In the end, we don’t know why Judas did what he did. Theories have been set forward, from a generous one saying he wanted to provoke Jesus into acting to assert his messianic power, to the more realistic one saying he really was base and greedy enough to sell out the Son of God for thirty pieces of silver. We don’t really know what got him started down the road in the first place. We do know both that Satan was directly involved and that God had sovereignly ordained that it come to pass this way. Neither excuses Judas.

The Bible doesn’t explicitly state who the evilest person who’s ever lived was, though it does state that Judas would have been better off “if he had not been born” (Matthew 26:24). But if we look at the very Biblical approach to evil that sins against greater knowledge are greater than sins against just the universal knowledge that makes everyone guilty before God, Judas must rank as the most offending soul ever.

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What Does the Old Testament Law Mean for Us Today?

A popular trend in skeptical circles is to attack Christianity through pronouncements people would perceive as ridiculous or barbarous in its laws with today’s mores. Not surprisingly, most of these come from the Old Testament. Most delicious to them is the fact that the Church no longer observes most of these precepts. I remember seeing a blog post one time about “Ten Things the Bible Says Not to Do, But You Do Anyway,” or something to that effect. The favorites are usually about the laws for kosher food that nobody observes today outside of Judaism or the execution of the following: homosexuals, adulterers, lazy children, children who curse parents, blasphemers, etc. (basically anything they don’t personally think is a big deal).

It’s amazing how many problems a little consultation with the Westminster Standards will solve. (For those of you not familiar with these sublime documents, they were Parliament’s attempt to bridge the differences between Anglicanism and Presbyterianism during the English Civil War. Presbyterians like myself accept these as secondary standards- that is, our guide to beliefs wherever they are not in conflict with Scripture, which is the primary standard).

Well, what does the Confession have to say about laws like this, which for the most part 17th century Britain did not enforce either? Chapter XIX:

“God gave Adam a law, as a covenant of works, by which He bound him and all his posterity to personal, entire, exact, and perpetual obedience (para. 1).”

“Besides this law, commonly called moral, God was pleased to give to the people of Israel, as a church under age, ceremonial laws […] All which ceremonial laws are now abrogated, under the new testament (para. 3).”

“To them also, as a body politic, He gave sundry judicial laws, which expired together with the State of that people; not obliging any other now, further than the general equity thereof may require (para. 4).”

So, for many of the unusual things in the Old Testament, we don’t observe them because God told us not to anymore. In the Mosaic law, you’ll find intertwined moral, ceremonial, and civil laws. The moral ones, yes, are as binding today as the day they were proclaimed on Mount Sinai. It’s still wrong to commit adultery or murder or to take God’s name in vain. 

The ceremonial law, however, was fulfilled in Christ. It symbolized how Israel needed to be separated from the rest of the world and carefully kept from all semblance of death and disorder to be fit for the presence of God. The ceremonial laws regarding blood, leprosy, etc. represent wholeness of life or stability in distinction from morality, which God dealt with in other laws. God explicitly did away with the ceremonial law when He gave Peter a vision and told him to eat unclean things, symbolizing that Israel was no longer on its own and that the Gospel was for all nations now. Christ has cleansed us with His blood, so we don’t need to make sacrifices or take baths to make ourselves clean in God’s sight.

Nowhere does Jesus or an Apostle try to force Mosaic civil laws on Rome.

I’m not really familiar with any verse as explicit as Peter’s vision in Acts as far as getting rid of the civil law of Israel, but it’s pretty clear God doesn’t want the Church governed like Israel. Israel was prone enough to corruption from without, so God mandated a wide range of capital punishments for wicked Jews to keep the nation pure. Now, though, He wants the Gospel of reconciliation offered to sinners, not war waged on them. Nowhere does Jesus or an Apostle try to force Mosaic civil laws on Rome.

As for executing homosexuals, that was not the Apostle Paul’s practice although he was proudly Jewish. He told the Corinthians: “Know ye not that the unrighteous shall not inherit the kingdom of God? Be not deceived: neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor effeminate, nor abusers of themselves with mankind [the KJV is trying to delicately refer to passive and active homosexuals], nor thieves, nor covetous, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor extortioners, shall inherit the kingdom of God. And such were some of you, but ye are washed, but ye are sanctified, but ye are justified in the Name of the Lord Jesus, and by the Spirit of our God” (I Corinthians 6:9-11).

So, a few observations about homosexuality in this passage that are relevant today. Yes, it is still a sin under the New Covenant; Christ’s death did nothing to change that, only to save from it. Second, it appears that Paul extended his ministry to homosexuals (of which there were many in the cult of Apollo in Corinth) just as readily and lovingly as to any other sinner. Finally, it appears they repented and overcame this sin (though no one said it would be any easier than the drunkards overcoming an addiction). So, there’s something for people to learn here on both sides of the cultural contest over homosexuality.

The moral ones, yes, are as binding today as the day they were proclaimed on Mount Sinai.

A lot of the civil code of Israel rubs enlightened Westerners the wrong way, but Jesus made an important observation about it in Matthew 19. Some of the Pharisees thought that, because the civil code allowed for divorce, they could morally divorce their wives for any reason. Jesus tells them that provision about divorce was only because of the “hardness of your hearts.” In other words, God doesn’t normally approve of divorce, but it could lead to worse if He clamped down on it in His civil law. When you look at the Old Testament’s milieu, with slavery and different tiers of justice being universal practice, a lot of the Torah’s civil law appears a compromise between the crude legal codes Israel was familiar with in the Ancient Near East and the higher ideals taught by Christ and the Apostles. The moral law is at all times the great standard of conduct, but the civil law may not always measure up to it. That said, many times it is a thousand times more enlightened than what you’ll find in Babylonian or Assyrian law.

The one problematic thing remaining is when we don’t know if something was a ceremonial or civil law. Generally, if you can tie it back to a duty required by one of the Ten Commandments or a sin forbidden by them, it’s moral. But sometimes there’s room for argument. There are laws against tattooing, blending fabrics, mixing seeds, interbreeding different species, and transvestitism. (Actually, the law against transvestitism is a little more specific than that; the Hebrew literally prohibits women from “bearing the accouterments of a warrior.”) Some of these seem harmless and are possibly even beneficial, like interbreeding horses and donkeys to make mules. In fact, the Jews were perfectly willing to buy mules from Gentiles as long as they didn’t breed them themselves, and God makes reference to mules in the new heavens and new earth in Isaiah. I’m pretty sure from my own research into these issues that you’ll find a commentator on every one of those laws who links it back to one of the Ten Commandments. I really don’t know on some of these, and I advise caution. As R.C. Sproul pointed out, it’s better to treat a ceremonial law like a moral one than a moral one like a ceremonial one.

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Six Even More Stupid Things People Thinks the Bible Says, Which It Doesn’t

Here is the 2024 installment of the Six Stupid Things series. Skeptics love to claim the Bible makes these absurd statements, when in fact, it says the opposite.

  1. Jesus denied being God.

The conversation between Jesus and the rich young ruler is important since all three Synoptic Gospels mention it, but it’s badly misunderstood by some. Two misconceptions will be addressed here. First, when the rich young ruler says, “Good master (i.e., Teacher), what good thing shall I do that I may have eternal life?” Jesus answers, “Why callest thou Me good? There is none good but one, that is God” (Matthew 19:16-17). I’ve heard it said that Jesus here is denying being God and being perfect. That would be inconsistent, however, for someone who claims the angels as His own and challenged His harshest critics to convict Him of one sin (John 8:46). I think Jesus says this for two reasons. One, He’s telling the rich young ruler, “You’re not good, so you can’t work your way into eternal life like you suppose.” Two, He’s saying, “If I’m good, it’s because I’m God.” He’s basically anticipating what C.S. Lewis would write 1,900 years later, that someone who makes the kind of claims Jesus makes can’t be just a Good Teacher like the rich young ruler calls Him. He must either be crazy, an evil deceiver, or God Himself. See my post on Lewis’s trilemma at https://deliberationsatmimirswell.blog/2017/10/03/lewiss-trilemma-defended/.

    He’s saying, “If I’m good, it’s because I’m God.”

    2. Christians are to give away everything they own.

      In the story of the rich young ruler, Jesus also tells him to sell all His possessions and give to the poor. Some have felt that all Christians are obligated to do this. St. Anthony’s reading of this is what started the monastic movement. While Jesus has the right to order such a thing from everybody, I think the Bible as a whole teaches that this was a specific challenge to this young man at his particular idol rather than a prescription of poverty for His entire Church. It’s true the Jerusalem Church practiced a form of Christian socialism at first, but the Greco-Roman Church did not. Note how in I Corinthians 16:2 Paul tells the Corinthians “to lay something aside,” not “lay everything aside.” In I Timothy 6, Paul gives instructions to rich Christians to be rich in good works and not to trust in their riches. The fact that he’s instructing rich Christians as rich Christians would make no sense if Jesus had prohibited all Christians from being rich at all times. Otherwise, Paul would have simply repeated Jesus’s command for them to sell all they have. Christians are called to be the most generous people on earth, but God has not chosen to overrule completely man’s propensity to appropriate. He even protects it with two of His Ten Commandments by banning theft and covetousness.

      3. The Apostles didn’t think of Jesus as God.

      Throughout his epistles he says things about Christ no monotheistic Hebrew of the Hebrews would dare say about an angel.

      Those who seek to deny Christ’s lordship will come up with the wildest interpretations of clear Scripture to avoid the plain fact that Paul and the other first Christians thought of Christ as God. Even a hostile witness like Pliny the Younger wrote a little after the New Testament period that the Christians were singing hymns to Christ like a God. No, Paul did not think of Jesus as a particularly exalted angel. He specifically calls Him God in Titus 2:13 and Romans 9:5. Throughout his epistles he says things about Christ no monotheistic Hebrew of the Hebrews would dare say about an angel: “Who, being in the very form of God” (Philippians 2:6); “according to the working whereby He is able even to subdue all things unto Himself” (Philippians 4:21); “And He is before all things, and by Him all things consist” (Philippians 1:17).

      4. Jesus commands us to hate our family.

      Jesus often spoke in a shocking and hyperbolic fashion that people take at face value to their peril. One commentator I heard of took deep umbrage at Jesus’s teaching in Luke 14:26: “If any man come to me and hate not his father and mother and wife and children and brethren and sisters, yea and his own life also, he cannot be my disciple.” Anyone with any sense of context of Scripture knows Jesus is not literally commanding any of His followers to hate anyone. If we are to love our enemies, how much more our family? Clearly, Jesus means that love of Him must be above and paramount to any other allegiance, so much so that earthly loves are “hatred” by comparison, and we are to always take Christ’s side over our family’s when they conflict. Jesus did not hate His own parents. He “was subject unto them” (Luke 2:51), and even during the agony of the cross, He found time and precious breath to provide for His mother’s care after His departure. 

      5. The Bible prescribes faith plus works for salvation.

      James writes, “Ye see then, how that by works a man is justified, and not by faith only?” (2:24). Latching onto this, the Roman Catholics made their formula of salvation faith plus works. Martin Luther found this book so inconvenient, he called it “an epistle of straw.” Time to let Scripture interpret Scripture. Paul, in a much more in-depth look at justification in Romans, states, “Therefore by the deeds of the Law, there shall no flesh be justified in his sight” (3:20). Jesus repeatedly tells the recipients of His healing, “Your faith has saved you.” James cannot be saying that we become right with God by producing works to add to our faith. (What could we possibly add to Jesus’s righteousness?) Rather, his point is, as he writes earlier, “Show me thy faith without thy works, and I will show you my faith by my works” (2:18). The kind of faith that God uses alone to save us will of necessity evidence itself in works. It’s not that you need to add works to saving faith; it’s that if you don’t have works, you don’t have saving faith.

      6. The Bible commands that we do penance for our sins.

      One popular stereotype of Christians in the unbelieving world is Christians harming themselves in penance for their sins. Take the self-flagellating monk in the Da Vinci Code or, with rather less excuse, my favorite YouTube channel Studio C’s depiction of the Puritan roommate. In the Roman Catholic tradition, prayers and other less self-destructive deeds are used to atone for sins. While penance (of a violent kind or otherwise) did develop as a tradition of the Middle Ages, there is not a hint of it in the New Testament. The closest thing you find to it in the Old Testament is fasting and wearing sackcloth, which are a lot less dangerous than flogging yourself. In the New Testament, with Christ’s perfect sacrifice to atone for our sins, there is nothing we can add to that. We are commanded to mourn for our sins and turn away in hatred from them to do good works, but none of the Apostles tell us to do anything to get right with God other than believe in Jesus’s all-sufficient work.

      Have you heard any of these from skeptics of the Bible? Yes, they are stupid things to say, but, no, the Bible doesn’t say them. In fact, it says the opposite.

      Posted on by deliberationsatmimirswell

      Book Release: The Honorable Spy

      Three spies. Three days. Three secrets.

      It’s 1905. Scottish spy Ranald MacKenzie, suffering from “Soldier’s Heart,” is plucked from his desk job when a report filters in that the Kaiser of Germany and Tsar of Russia are secretly communicating about an alliance to unite the major powers of Europe against Britain. MacKenzie is sent on a sensitive mission to defuse the situation and prevent a world war. Battling anxiety and uncertainty, he soldiers on, fortified by his love of country and his faith in God.

      MacKenzie is partnered with a beautiful, mysterious agent claiming to be Catriona Cameron, who is reported “missing” in Germany. She is a woman haunted by her own secret memories of a terrible event that forever changed her life. Smart, unpredictable, and—in MacKenzie’s eyes— immoral, Cameron will do whatever it takes to complete the mission.

      Trailing the pair’s steps lurks Leopold Tirpitz, German Intelligence’s foremost interrogator. He is desperate to catch the spies lest his own secrets be revealed.

      As events intensify, MacKenzie and Cameron race against time to save lives. And the question remains: How far can you go before your compromise your honor?

      Posted on by deliberationsatmimirswell

      Why I Want My Movies Historically Accurate

      I love historical movies. Thanks to technology, they bring people about as close as they’ll ever come to experiencing the great turning points in history or the deeds of their favorite heroes. They stir interest in particular events that many people before didn’t know had happened. They can help us appreciate the human condition better by depicting how it developed over time. If I were to pick my top ten movies, I’d bet most of them would be historical. What I can’t stand, however, is glaring historical inaccuracies.

      I’m not talking about minor liberties and adaptations to the limited format of the big screen. I think we all know it’s impossible to portray any event with absolute accuracy. We don’t know every detail about any event, so there are inevitably gaps (often quite large) we have to fill in with our imagination. If you’re going to portray a two-year-long event in two hours, there are going to need to be some adaptations. Most historical events had more people involved than is feasible to cast in a movie, so you’ll have to conflate some characters or leave some out. Other things just won’t play well on a movie. To cite one clear example, the Mahdi and General “Chinese” Gordon exchanged a number of letters during the Siege of Khartoum without ever actually meeting in person. Clearly, to keep the audience engaged, though, in the movie Khartoum they have to meet in person and discuss things face-to-face. Or even making a relatively minor character up to witness and tell the story like historical fiction does- I see nothing wrong with that.

      However, I have a few major objections to movies that blatantly fabricate or change major aspects of history. For one thing, it’s dangerously close to lying. People go to historical movies to get a sense of things that happened (if they didn’t care about the past at all, all movies would be set in the present), and the moviemakers are playing to that impulse, but then they betray it by contravening the history. How can you judge the progress of the human condition if you’re being fed false information about it?

      Often, that lying pretty much becomes slander. Rarely do moviemakers change the facts to make the villains less villainous. I love the movie Breaker Morant even though I do not believe there were standing orders to shoot all Boer prisoners besides those caught wearing British khaki uniforms. After all, other companies of the same regiment were bringing in Boer prisoners. In its attempt to portray Morant and his confreres as (relatively) innocent, however, the moviemakers have Ian Hamilton commit perjury by denying the order to shoot prisoners in court after swearing by God.

      While we’re talking about taking prisoners, I would like to say a few words about the portrayal of Banastre Tarleton in The Patriot. He’s called Colonel Tavington in the movie, but there’s no doubting whom Tavington is supposed to represent. In reality, while Tarleton was, no question, a scoundrel and a pain in the neck who could use a heavy hand on the rebels, the most egregious tales of his crimes against humanity are very suspect. Certainly he never incinerated civilians in a church (that was the Nazis, not the British).

      The main report of “Tarleton’s Quarters” (on the basis of which the Patriots themselves sometimes refused to take prisoners) comes from the Battle of Waxhaws. The fighting there (which was almost entirely between Patriots and American Loyalists) did get savage, but that was not because Tarleton ordered his men to take no prisoners. His version, which even has the corroboration of the American officer involved, was that, just as the Patriots raised a white flag, someone shot his horse out from under him. His men, thinking the Patriots had murdered their beloved commander under a flag of truce, went into what Tarleton called “a vindictive asperity not easily restrained.” Evidently he did eventually restore order since they did take some prisoners and did not execute the wounded, like Tavington would have. This brutality was not their standard practice. Tarleton himself said that he took “many prisoners of all ranks” during the pursuit after the Battle of Camden. (For the record, “Light Horse Harry” Lee’s Legion massacred a unit of Loyalists in turn, but you can see his nickname is a lot more complimentary than “Bloody Tarleton.”)

      Historical inaccuracy is also taking advantage of the uninformed. The Da Vinci Code, which historians have thoroughly blasted for the liberties it takes, actually convinced some people that Christianity is a fraud. Some people are too lazy to care about following up on historical stories, but even the thoughtful might only see your movie to get a gauge of what has happened in a particular event. This is often their first real experience of the event. Once you give them a particular visual and audio impression, it can stay with them and color their future perceptions. Don’t mislead them.

      Even the heroes shouldn’t approve of historical inaccuracy when it makes exploits up for them. Basically, isn’t the scriptwriter saying to them, “Your story and what you did aren’t good enough. Here, let me improve it for you”? Isn’t that rather condescending and insulting? Is it really honoring someone to base their reputation on a lie rather than their actual deeds?

      Now, I know the traditional defense is that historical inaccuracies make the movie more exciting and draw in more viewers. I would rejoin that, if you don’t think the story’s good enough as it is to entertain people, don’t use a historical setting. You’re using real people and real events and playing on the “realness” factor (again, that’s why you set movies in historical periods) to bring people in, so don’t lie to them.

      Posted on by deliberationsatmimirswell

      Laughing at Sin

      Comedy is a human tradition as old as art. The earliest practitioners of theatre, the Athenians, had many famous tragedies, but they also entered comedies in their competitions. Some of us devote half an hour a week for the space of a decade for shows like Cheers and Friends (okay, I’m exaggerating there, but you get the idea). Comedy is extremely varied, but much of it involves sinful actions. A character makes an underhanded scheme that blows up in his face. Someone lies and gets found out. Some shows devote most of their airtime to sexual jokes, obscenities, and profanities.

      Several pastors I know of have said that it is wrong for Christians to laugh at sinful situations. I can understand their concern. Sin is a deadly serious matter. One way or another, every sin is going to result in a curse, whether it’s Christ becoming accursed for us on the Cross or that person becoming accursed forever in Hell. What could possibly be funny about that?

      Well, despite the prevalence of comedy in our culture, the Bible says fairly little about it. One admonition it does give is that obscenity, foolish talking, and crude joking are not fitting for saints (Ephesians 5:4). While this does not quite answer the question of if we can laugh at those things as long as they’re not coming out of our own mouths, it does indicate to me that we should steer clear of shows where that’s the common fare. So, a whole bunch of current shows are out. Back when television standards were more tight-laced, however, there were still plenty of hilarious, albeit more refined, shows. And I don’t suppose an instance or two of those things means we can’t ever watch an episode of the show ever again. Can we avoid those things in their entirety without going out of the world?

      But, let’s say the humor isn’t dirty, but otherwise sinful. The underhanded scheme gone wrong, the lie that gets found out, the lazy person trying to get out of a commitment, etc. I don’t think we’re laughing because we approve of those things or even because we wouldn’t think they were a big deal in reality. I think what makes them funny is the irony when the guilty party admits what they’re doing openly to or tries some weak excuse- in other words, it’s funny because, while we might think such things, none of us would dare to state our underhanded purpose so blatantly. The British comedies Yes, Minister and Yes, Prime Minister make fun of the bureaucratic mentality. When Sir Humphrey or one of the civil servants says what they’re up to or what their reasoning is, it’s funny because we know bureaucrats really think that way but a real one would never admit it in such plain language. Or it’s funny because the person gets themselves in a tight, awkward position through their scheming- we don’t approve of it, and it’s amusing to see them get their just desserts, usually in a broadly predictable pattern with a slightly ironic nuance.

      One sin I think we should avoid as much as possible is blasphemy. In most shows today, there will be multiple “OMG”s and other taking of the Lord’s name in vain. Frankly, it would be best for us if we were as reticent about taking God’s name in vain as we are in using the N-word. The Bible is extremely reticent about this sin. I can’t think of a single time someone blasphemes and the Bible actually reports their words. It says, “The person blasphemed,” or, “On it were written blasphemous names.” If the Biblical writers are so determined not to expose their readers to blasphemy, I think we should do our best to avoid it although, again, the only way to avoid that completely is to never associate with a non-Christian again, and obviously that’s not what we’re supposed to do.

      As a general rule, though, I think laughing at such sins, as long as we’re not tempted to do them ourselves, is okay. My chief evidence for this is Psalm 2. The whole world is arraying itself against God and Christ, and God’s first reaction is, “He that sitteth in the Heavens shall laugh. The Lord shall have them in derision.” Humor is largely based on irony, and what could be more ironic than utterly dependent creatures openly resisting the omnipotent God?

      So, I think we need to understand what’s making us laugh in these comedy shows. Laughter doesn’t always mean that it’s not a big deal in reality. What we usually laugh at are carefully contrived fictional scenarios that bring out ironic words from the characters’ mouths. Were someone really doing these things to us, we wouldn’t be laughing. That said, there are things the Bible fairly clearly states we should do our best not to expose ourselves to. As always, we have to keep the glory of God foremost in our mind.

      Posted on by deliberationsatmimirswell

      Is It Ever Right to Lie? Part II: The Arguments For

      So we’ve seen the strong case that can be made that God condemns every lie. On the other hand, Martin Luther and others have crafted a wide range of theories to justify lying in the desperate extremity of trying to save human life. Some say that the obligation to protect life is higher than the obligation to tell the truth in some cases where an individual is acting totally depraved. Others argue that someone who’s out to get other people cannot expect to be told the truth, so we are not obligated to give it to him since he should know it’s not going to be forthcoming.

      Now, I readily state that it is no light matter to try to find an exception to an express command in Scripture. Indeed, I have thought about this long and hard, remembering Jesus’s words that, “Whosoever therefore shall break the least of these commandments and shall teach men so, he shall be called the least in the Kingdom of Heaven” (Matthew 5:19, KJV). I therefore invite anyone who’s given better thought to the matter than I to dispute the matter around Mimir’s well in the comments section before I give my conclusion.

      Let’s look at the examples. The two most famous are the midwives in Egypt and Rahab the harlot that I mentioned in the first post. These are not, however, the whole story. Saints of far greater magnitude than these three have felt the need to lie to save life. David crafts a tale for Jonathan to use to extract the truth from Saul whether Saul is trying to kill David, and Jonathan carries it out. Elisha tells the Syrian raiders who are seeking to kill him (no doubt as much to save their lives as his own), “This is not the way; neither is this the city. Follow me, and I will bring you to the man whom ye seek” (II Kings 6:19). Now, the hair-splitters say that Elisha is telling the truth here because it’s no longer the city, Elisha having just left it. Well, I find that sophistic since he’s clearly misleading them from the plain truth that, “I’m right here, guys.” But if they insist on hair-splitting, I can play that game too. The Syrians are very clearly on the right way since they have found their quarry. In Judges 4, Jael deceives Sisera, even if it’s not exactly a lie, when she tells him to “fear not” while she’s planning to kill him. Hushai lies to Absalom while trying to protect David from him. Two last minor instances. In II Samuel 17, a woman lies to hide the sons of the priests who have been spying for David, and I really doubt Joshua’s spies introduced themselves to the Canaanites as Israelite spies.

      We should consider a case study. If a burglar invades your home at night and demands to know if you have any children upstairs (and you do), you really have only three responses. One is to affirm the truth that they are upstairs, at which point the burglar will go off to harm or abduct them. Another is to refuse to answer, which in some cases may be the right answer, but we all know that in this case it will be as good as saying they are upstairs. Lastly you can try to deceive the burglar and say no one else is at home and hope he’ll buy it. Basically, if you tell the truth in that situation, your one hope is that God will make the burglar trip on his way upstairs and break his neck. While this is possible, I can’t think of a single Biblical case where a Christian opted for that approach. Indeed, to tell the truth in that situation would only help an evil man accomplish an evil thing.

      Just considering the context of these lies, the Bible seems to tacitly condone it if nothing else. Certainly, if no one is explicitly commended for lying to save life, no one is specifically called out for it either. Elisha is full of faith right before he lies to the Syrians, and he’s in complete control of the situation, so how can we think his faith failed him for that moment? Likewise, while the midwives and Rahab are doing things that are worthy of explicit blessing from Scripture, are we to believe that they are doing something damnable at the exact same time? Hushai shows up and receives his instructions from David to lie to Absalom right after David has worshipped and prayed to God for some kind of rescue from Ahithophel’s crafty counsel that will now be turned against him. Are we to think that David, at this moment of faith, suddenly resorts to something that could get him and his friend sent to Hell?

      I think that the context shows that God approves of us lying in life-or-death situations. The problem is, I have no hard-and-fast principle for when and why it’s right. I think the Bible abstains from giving explicit commendation to these deceivers because such a statement would be so open to abuse. But I also find the various theories as to how it could be justifiable to lie lacking.

      I like the hierarchialists best and consider myself one of them, but even they produce no firm principle to grasp onto. Hierarchialists believe that certain moral imperatives can trump others when they conflict. We know that this does, in fact, happen in Scripture. Romans 13 orders us to obey the authorities, but when the Sanhedrin commands the Apostles not to preach Christ, they are quite right to put their obligation to evangelize above their obligation to submit to government. I personally see this worked out when David promises to Saul that he will not cut off his posterity after him but then has to break that promise to honor the earlier promise to the Gibeonites. Hierarchialists can explain that Peter was wrong and the others right because there is no higher obligation than to honor Christ. In the other cases, hierarchialists posit that saving life is more important than telling the truth. The problem is, Proverbs on two occasions (6:30-31 and 30:9) condemns those who steal to keep themselves alive, showing that the obligation to save life does not trump the obligation to protect property. I used to think that lying was justified in these cases because the Ten Commandments are listed in order of importance and the commandment to protect life comes before the commandment to tell the truth. I still think they are in order of importance, but my logic breaks down in its conclusion because the commandment against murder also comes before the commandment to not steal. So there’s no black-and-white test for saying what moral commandment precedes which.

      The other arguments have their flaws too. The argument that an adversary in warfare or criminal committing a crime has made an “implicit agreement to deceive and be deceived” doesn’t quite hold water with me because, if they know they can’t expect the truth from their opponent, they wouldn’t ask the question in the first place. The idea that someone wanting to use the truth to harm others has forfeited the right to the truth seems intuitively right to me, but it’s nowhere stated in Scripture.

      So, while I hope you never find yourself in a situation when you have to lie to protect yourself or your loved ones, I don’t think God will condemn you if you do. I can’t give you a hard-and-fast rule as to why that would be right in the face of all the Bible verses condemning lying, but I think the overall impression Scripture conveys is that it is what a saint can, and maybe even should, do.

      Posted on by deliberationsatmimirswell

      Is It Ever Right to Lie? Part I: The Arguments Against

      The Bible is full of condemnations of lying. Bearing false witness is banned in the Ten Commandments, the prophets denounce the dishonesty of their contemporaries, and finally Revelation says that anyone who “maketh a lie” shall “in no wise enter” Heaven (21:27, KJV). Yet the Bible also reports several cases where saints deceive to save themselves or others in dire circumstances. Indeed, they seem to have no other choice. This has led to the question of if Christians are ever permitted to lie for a higher purpose.

      Let’s be clear about what lying is, first. Lying is stating something you know to be untrue with the intent to mislead someone else into believing it. It’s not telling a fictional story or a joke because the context makes it clear that you are not intending to be taken literally. In fact, prophets up to and including Jesus tell many fictional parables to illustrate a deeper truth. That’s just art. It’s also not concealing something you know. There are many times when tact is preferable, even more loving, than full candor. Famously, in I Samuel 16, God gives Samuel a cover story to mislead anyone who might report his trip to Bethlehem to Saul. What God tells Samuel to say is true, but it leaves out the main purpose of his visit, which is to anoint David. It’s not speaking in approximations or exaggerations when you are making a basically truthful point because there are verses in Scripture that contradict themselves if we don’t allow for the inspiration of the Holy Spirit using approximations and exaggerations. Lastly, it’s not conveying false information that you believe to be true, though usually you should make a correction when you find out you were wrong if it’s on something important enough.

      Those who say lying is never justified have the easy task since that is the most straightforward reading of the Bible. They say that the Bible’s commands against lying are given in an absolute way and that it never explicitly approves of those who lie in these dire situations, even though what they are doing otherwise is laudable. In one of the two most famous examples, God blesses the midwives in Egypt, who spare the Hebrew babies from Pharaoh’s death sentence and then manufacture a story to tell Pharaoh that they could not carry out his command. In the other, James praises Rahab, who took Joshua’s spies into her home to hide them and then told her fellow Canaanites that they had left. In both cases, the praise is clearly on their saving life, and the Bible is silent on the subject of their lying to further their objectives. Since Protestants know that individual initiatives cannot override God’s clear decree, many believe that there is no way to justify a lie. St. Augustine was firmly against it. He believed that any compromise in a Christian’s reputation for truthfulness is a compromise in the trustworthiness of their Gospel message.

      Tellingly, Jesus was tempted in every way that we are, but He never lied. Scripture says God cannot lie, and we are supposed to resemble Him as His children. (On the other hand, Jesus, knowing full well when His hour had or had not come, never had the need to lie to save His life. Maybe that’s why Abraham was wrong to lie about Sarah not being his wife, since he also had firm promises to rely on, while those who don’t know how things are going to turn out could be right to lie.)

      Since Protestants know that individual initiatives cannot override God’s clear decree, many believe that there is no way to justify a lie.

      There is one case study, in fact, where Scripture condemns lying even to save life. Peter denies Christ three times to keep himself from going to the cross with Him, and the guilt ravages his conscience. However favorable a light Scripture casts on the other liars, here’s one it clearly condemns for the lie itself.

      The Bible time and again shows that God takes very seriously what we say, presumably because He’s given words such power. We say that actions speak louder than words, and James is all for that when he says that blessing someone in need is not as good as actually giving them something, but we should not discount words entirely. According to some interpretations of blasphemy against the Holy Spirit, He has decreed that He will not forgive a certain sin of speech, rather than a certain action. Human language is by far the predominant way, if not the only way, we obtain knowledge outside our own personal experience. We can only be one place at one time, but through words anyone who’s been anywhere can shape our perceptions of the world around us. That’s why false testimony is condemned in the Ten Commandments. It also says that those who invent news stories and rumors to shape public opinion based on falsehood have a lot to answer for.

      So, there’s a strong case in Scripture about never lying, even to save life. One thing we can all agree on is that it is never right to lie with the intent of hurting someone. The issue here is if there’s the tiniest little exception in a dire circumstance that most of us will never experience. I’ll look at the arguments for there being such an exception in the next post.

      Posted on by deliberationsatmimirswell

      The Christian’s Checkbook, Part II: The Christian Manifesto

      So, we see that giving is a Christian duty, albeit one to be done with willing cheerfulness. In fact, so much stress does the Bible put on giving that at points it sounds downright socialistic. We are told of the earliest Church in Jerusalem that, “All that believed were together and had all things common and sold their possessions and goods and parted them to all men as every man had need” (Acts 2:44-45). Paul writes as a principle of Christian giving, “But by an equality, that now at this time your abundance may be a supply for their want, that their abundance also may be a supply for your want, that there may be equality. As it is written, ‘He that had gathered much had nothing over, and he that gathered little had no lack’” (II Corinthians 8:14-15). That sounds an awful lot like the refrain of the Communist Manifesto: “From each according to his ability to each according to his need.” Most famously, Jesus told the rich young ruler to sell all his possessions and give to the poor.

      Well, I couldn’t affirm or deny the obligation to tithe, but I can categorically state that socialism isn’t really what the Bible has in mind. For one thing, if socialism was God’s ideal, it wouldn’t have such an appalling track record. Socialism has wrecked countless countries and brought misery to their citizens while capitalism has created the richest societies of all time. When God was designing a state to be governed by His direct decree (Old Testament Israel), He made ample provision for the poor but nowhere insisted on socialism. In fact, two of the Ten Commandments, as Dr. Sproul observed, are designed to protect private property. It seems God recognizes what Lord Kames called mankind’s propensity to appropriate. The Pastorals and James have instructions to rich Christians dealing with them as rich Christians, an underlying assumption which makes no sense if all Christians are to give all their belongings to the poor. After the first few chapters of Acts, you don’t see any of this Christian socialism at work as the Church spreads.

      Which leaves Paul’s seeming anticipation of the Communist Manifesto. I think what Paul is getting at is found in his explanation in the preceding verse: “For I mean not that other men be eased and you burdened, but by an equality” (II Corinthians 8:13-14, KJV). I think Paul means that Christians should care for one another such that they all have to work about equally strenuously for their daily bread. It’s a qualitative, not a quantitative, equality. If you want to go above and beyond and snag the really well-paying job to provide more abundantly for yourself and your family, you’d just be prospering through diligence like Proverbs praises.

      So, how much should Christians give? Tithing is obviously neither wrong nor unreasonable since God required it of believers at one point. If you tithe with a joyful heart, God certainly won’t be displeased. But, really, the New Testament calls us to give as much as we are able. C.S. Lewis thought a good rule of thumb was that we should give such that it cuts into our lifestyle, that is, that we can’t live at the same level of comfort as our peers in our wage level. That’s Christian sacrificial love right there.

      Posted on by deliberationsatmimirswell

      The Christian’s Checkbook, Part I: A Voluntary Duty

      I heard a lecturer once who made an observation along the lines that God saves our checkbooks in addition to our souls. That’s sound because the Bible does tell us to put our money where our mouth is, so to speak. It’s doubly important in the Western Church, which has more resources than any church in history.

      The big question in some circles is whether Christians are obligated to tithe. That question I can’t answer definitively. Tithing (paying a tenth of one’s money and goods) was required of Old Testament Israel, but that principle is nowhere repeated in the New Testament. In fact, when Peter is asked if Jesus pays the temple tax, Jesus has him pay it for Himself and Peter as a concession, not a command. He asks Peter if “kings of the earth take custom or tribute of their own children or of strangers.” Peter answers that they tax strangers, and Jesus concludes, “Then are the children free” (Matthew 17:25-26, KJV). He pays the tax not because He has to but simply so as not to offend. This might indicate that Christians are not bound by Old Testament rules of giving.

      Yet give they must. Paul instructed the Corinthians before he visited, “Upon the first day of the week, let everyone of you lay by him in store, as God hath prospered him,” collections for the Jerusalem saints in need. True, Paul wants giving to be voluntary and cheerful, but he does expect it. In Galatians 6:6, he exhorts the Galatians to share all good things with their teachers, and while he himself did not take money from the Corinthians, he adamantly informed them that ministers have a right to be supported by their congregations. As he told Timothy, “The laborer is worthy of his reward” (I Timothy 5:18, KJV). Jesus told two parables where the king gives his servants ancient units of money (a mina in one story and talents in the other) and expects them to use them towards his profit when he returns. In fact, he is furious with the servant in both stories who refuses to do anything with the money entrusted to him. After another parable, Jesus says to, “Make to yourselves friends of the Mammon of unrighteousness” (Luke 16:9, KJV). In other words, we should give voluntarily, but it is still a duty. You could say that about any duty God gives us, like love, prayer, and forgiveness. He wants it done with our whole heart willingly, but that doesn’t excuse us from not doing it just because we don’t feel like it. As in any good habit or duty we need to cultivate but don’t feel like, we have to do it until we love it. We can’t just wait for an enthusiastic impulse, which may never come with that attitude.

      Christians have more reason than anybody else to be generous. They believe an all-powerful, all-wise God has promised to provide for them and reward them eternally for anything they give in His name. They believe He has called them to love others as themselves. James famously describes how charity shows forth the faith we have. And consider that God required this giving of people with much less economic stability than us. They were paid daily because they needed those wages for the very next day and had the ever-present danger of crop failures, epidemics, and raids hanging over them.