Why Morality is Not Christian ~ Fr. Stephen Freeman

Why Morality is Not Christian

September 9, 2011 · Fr. Stephen Freeman

   I recall my first classes in Moral Theology some 35 or so years ago. The subject is an essential part of Western thought (particularly in the Catholic and Anglican traditions). In many ways the topic was like a journey into Law School. We learned various methods and principles on whose basis moral questions – questions of right and wrong – could be discussed and decided. These classes were also the introduction of certain strains of doubt for me.

The great problem with most moral thinking – is found in its fundamental questions:

•  What does it mean to act morally?
• Why is moral better than immoral?
• Why is right better than wrong?

Such questions have classically had some form of law to undergird them:

• To act morally is to act in obedience to the law or to God’s commandments.
• Moral is better than immoral because moral is a description of obedience to the good God. Or, moral is the description of doing the good, or even the greatest good for the greatest number (depending on your school of thought).
• Right is better than wrong for the same reasons as moral being better than immoral.

   Of course, all of these questions (right and wrong, moral and immoral) require not only a standard of conduct, but someone to enforce the conduct. Right is thus better than wrong, because God will punish the wrong and reward the right – otherwise (in this understanding) everything would be merely academic.
I will grant at the outset that many Christians are completely comfortable with the understanding that God rewards and punishes. I will grant as well that there is ample Scriptural evidence to which persons can point to support such a contention. However, this approach is far from a unanimous interpretation within the Tradition of the faith – and has little support within historic Eastern Orthodoxy.
That Scripture says such things (God is the punisher and rewarder) is undeniable – but there is also another strain of witness:

When James and John approached Christ after He had been turned away by a village of Samaritans, they said, “Lord, do You want us to command fire to come down from heaven and consume them, just as Elijah did?” But He turned and rebuked them, and said, “You do not know what manner of spirit you are of. “For the Son of Man did not come to destroy men’s lives but to save them.” And they went to another village. (Luk 9:54-56)

   If James and John were working out of a “reward and punishment” model (which they clearly were) Christ’s rebuke must have caught them by surprise. The same is true of many other encounters in Christ’s ministry. The interpretation brought by the fathers in all of this, is that God’s role as “punisher” is only an aspect of His role as “healer.” What we endure is not for our destruction and punishment but for our salvation and healing.
This takes everything into a different direction. It is, doubtless, an interpretation brought to the Old Testament from the revelation of Christ in the New. In Christ we see clearly what was only made known in “shadow” under the Old Covenant. Through Him, we now see more clearly.
God as Christ brings an entirely different set of questions to the moral equation:

• What does the Incarnation of God mean for human morality?
• What is at stake in our decisions about right and wrong?
• What does it mean to be moral?

   St. Athanasius (ca. 296 – d. 2 May 373), the great father of the Nicene Council and defender of the faith against the assaults of Arianism offered profound insights into the nature of the human predicament (sin and redemption). His approach, as given in De Incarnatione, begins with the creation of the world from nothing (ex nihilo). Our very existence is a good thing, given to us and sustained by the mercy and grace of the good God. The rupture in communion that occurs at the Fall (and in every sin), is a rejection of the true existence given to us by God. Thus the problem of sin is not a legal issue, but an ontological issue (a matter of being and true existence). The goal of the Christian life is union with God, to be partakers of His Divine Life. Sin rejects that true existence and moves us away from God and towards a spiral of non-being.
Thus, our issues are not moral in nature (obeying things because they are right, etc.) but ontological in nature. The great choice of humanity is between union with God and His Life, or a movement towards non-being and emptiness. Our salvation is not a juridical matter – it is utterly ontological. The great promises in Christ point consistently in that direction.

I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that you present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable to God, which is your reasonable service. And do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, that you may prove what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God. (Rom 12:1-2)

But we all, with unveiled face, beholding as in a mirror the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from glory to glory, just as by the Spirit of the Lord. (2Co 3:18-1)

For it is the God who commanded light to shine out of darkness, who has shone in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ. But we have this treasure in earthen vessels, that the excellence of the power may be of God and not of us. We are hard pressed on every side, yet not crushed; we are perplexed, but not in despair; persecuted, but not forsaken; struck down, but not destroyed–always carrying about in the body the dying of the Lord Jesus, that the life of Jesus also may be manifested in our body. For we who live are always delivered to death for Jesus’ sake, that the life of Jesus also may be manifested in our mortal flesh. So then death is working in us, but life in you. (2Co 4:6-12)

   Such verses, which could be multiplied many times, point towards our salvation as a change that occurs within us, rather than a shift in our juridical status – having settled all our justice issues, etc. Rather, we are told that “God is working in us to will and to do of His good pleasure” (Phil. 2:13). Our salvation is nothing less than conformity with the image of God, a true communion of life and participation in the Divine Nature.

Juridical approaches obscure all of this. Concerns for justice quickly denigrate the faith into a cosmic law court (or penal system). Most problematically, the issues tend to be objectified and stand outside the life of believers. To be free of all legal issues that stand between ourselves and God is still far short of paradise. Our goal is to be transformed into union with Christ – to be healed of sin and to be made new. This requires a change within our inmost being – the establishment of the “true self” which is “hid with Christ in God.”

As for justice – it remains a mystery. Christ speaks of God rewarding one group of workers who labored only at the end of the day in a manner that was equal to those who had labored the entire day. The principle at work seems to be something other than a concern for justice (this is an example used by St. Isaac the Syrian).

Morality, as a systematic form of study, is a degeneration of true Christian teaching. Like secularism (and the two-storey universe) it can presume to discuss questions as though there were no God. Morality (and its ethical cousins) becomes a “science,” an abstract exercise of reason based (often) on principles that are merely assumed.  The Scriptures tell us that there is “none good but God,” neither can there be anything good that does not proceed from God. The “good” actions that we make are actions that lead us deeper into union with Christ. Such actions begin in God, are empowered by God, and lead to God. “Morality” is fiction, at least as it has come to be treated in modern thought.

The sin that infects our lives and produces evil actions is a mortal illness (death). Only union with the true life in Christ can heal this, transform us and birth us into the true life which is ours in Christ.

 

   As I have stated on numerous occasions: Christ did not die in order to make bad men good – he died in order to make dead men live.

If my treatment of the word morality is disturbing – I ask your forgiveness. I hope this small piece is of use in considering the true nature of our life in Christ. One of my favorite stories from the Desert Fathers illustrates (obliquely) the difference between mere morality and a true ontological change.

 +++

Abba Lot went to see Abba Joseph and said to him, “Abba as far as I can, I say my little office, I fast a little, I pray and meditate, I live in peace and as far as I can, I purify my thoughts. What else can I do?” then the old man stood up and stretched his hands towards heaven. His fingers became like ten lamps of fire and he said to him, “If you will, you can become all flame.”

 

 

Thanks to:

 

https://blogs.ancientfaith.com/glory2godforallthings/2011/09/09/why-morality-is-not-christian/

 

December 5, 2016

Holy Hatred

   Lately I came across an interesting bit of theologizing.  The author (who shall remain nameless) spoke of his love for Psalm 139 (“one of my absolute favorite psalms”).  In it he said that “right smack dab in the middle of this Psalm, King David calls for God to slay his enemies and declares that he has nothing but hatred for them.”  He refers, of course, to verse 21:  “Do I not hate them who hate You, O Lord?  And do I not loathe them that rise up against You?  I hate them with perfect hatred; I count them my enemies.”  The author contrasts this attitude with Christ’s words about loving one’s enemies, and characterizes the voice of David in this verse as “the sinful voice of a human.”  Though he says we ought not to “throw the Old Testament out, nor read it flatly without any discernment,” and though he asserts that while “Psalm 139 is full of inspiration,” he still says, “David’s own paradigm comes through.  It’s all [David] knows in his time.  He can’t yet apply the awareness of his divine belovedness [sic] to his enemies.”  The upshot is that we must “pick and choose in the Bible.  Always pick and choose Jesus.”  That is, for him some bits in the Scriptures are devoid of inspiration or authority, and ought to be jettisoned since they are merely the voices of sinful humans, men incapable of rising to a divine standard.  If something in the Old Testament mirrors the Gospel counsel in the New Testament, it may be allowed to stand.  If not, out it goes.  It is not the sinful Old Testament author’s fault however; “it’s all he knows in his time.”  It is an extraordinary bit of exegesis, worthy of the heretic Marcion himself—or perhaps of the Biblical sceptics that made German theological liberalism so famous in the last century.

   It is difficult to deal with the author’s exegesis in any depth, since his thought is not clear.  Since he may or may not be capitalizing pronouns referring to God (e.g. “David calls for God to slay his enemies”), it is hard to be sure of his meaning:  does he assert that smack dab in the middle of the Psalm King David calls for God to slay David’s enemies, or God’s enemies?  The immediate contrast with Christ’s counsel to love one’s own personal enemies would suggest the former, in which case his exegesis is simply wrong.  King David declares his hatred not for his own foes, but for God’s foes—that is the point of saying that he regards them as if they were his own enemies.  If he was talking about his own personal enemies, the verse would make no sense—of course one regards one’s own foes as foes.  The point was David’s zeal for God, which impelled him to make God’s cause his own.  Though those men were not David’s personal enemies, he regarded them as if they were in his zeal for God.

   This bit of confused theologizing is significant because many people fall into the same trap of regarding bits of the Old Testament as unworthy, unspiritual, immoral, and (frankly) as rather embarrassing.  No less a thinker than C. S. Lewis looked at the cursings in the Psalter as something unfortunate, embarrassing, and to be explained away (in his otherwise wonderful book Reflections on the Psalms).  But a view of Old Testament Scripture which declares that “whoever relaxes one of the least these commandments and teaches men so shall be called least in the Kingdom of heaven,” and that “it is easier for heaven and earth to pass away than for one dot of the Law to become void” [Matthew 5:19, Luke 16:17] will not so easily jettison chunks of those Scriptures.  Neither ancient Marcionism nor modern Biblical liberalism are live options for the Orthodox.
  
And make no mistake:  the offending bits are indeed large chunks.  Our unnamed author spoke of his favorite Psalm 139, but similar citations could easily be multiplied.  Many other parts of the Psalter extol holy hatred of unrighteousness and disgust at those who promote it.  Take for example Psalm 119, so valued by the Orthodox that it is constantly used in Matins.  Look at verse 53:  “Hot indignation seizes me because of the wicked who forsake Your Law.”  Or look at verse 113:  “I hate double-minded men, but I love Your Law.”  Or verse 136:  “My eyes shed streams of tears because men do not keep Your Law.”  Or verse 139:  “My zeal consumes me, because my foes forget Your words.”  Or verse 158:  “I look at the faithless with disgust because they do not keep Your commands.”  Such an abundance of antipathy in a psalm which has won such a place in the liturgical tradition of the Church cannot be so easily dismissed by simply suggesting that “it’s all the Psalmist knows in his time,” as if the Holy Spirit found the task of inspiring a sinful Psalmist too daunting.  We cannot jettison it as unworthy.  The solution to our perceived dilemma must lie elsewhere.
One thing the unnamed author never did was to inquire what the word “hate” meant in the offending verse.  He apparently assumed that it meant “to plan to hurt, to retaliate, to strive to inflict pain and misery, to slay.”  Christ indeed forbids such a lust for revenge and for gleeful infliction of pain upon one’s personal foes.  We must not try to hurt our personal foes—bashing them over the head or keying their car—but simply pray for them and commend them to God.  But there is no evidence that the Psalmist in Psalms 139 or 119 was talking about that kind vengeful action.
  
We may begin by asking what the word “hate” actually means in its Biblical context.  Briefly, it means to categorically and emphatically reject.  Thus Christ tells us to “hate” our father and mother and wife and children and even our own life if we would truly be His disciples [Luke 14:26].  Obviously He does not mean one should entertain personal loathing for our family or try to hurt them.  He means that if it comes down to a choice between family and Christ, we must categorically and emphatically reject all the members of our family and their appeals to family loyalty, and choose Christ instead.  To hate means to reject.  That is also the meaning of God’s declaration in Malachi 1:2-3 (quoted in Romans 9:13):  “I loved Jacob but I have hated Esau.”  God did not loathe Esau personally.  He “hated” him in that He rejected him as bearer of Abraham’s covenant, and confirmed that covenant to his brother Jacob instead.

   Understanding this allows us to return to the Psalter with fresh eyes.  David (and the author of Psalm 119) were not declaring that they personally loathed wicked and evil men and wanted to hurt them so much as they decisively rejected their evil ways.  David was declaring his decision to shun their wicked ways however attractive they might have been and to choose righteousness instead.  That is why immediately after saying that he hated God’s foes with perfect hatred, he went on to say, “Search me, O God, and know my heart!  Try me and know my thoughts and see if there be any wicked way in me and lead me in the everlasting way.”  He hated wickedness when he found it in wicked men, and also when he found it in himself, which is why he asked for God’s help to root it out from his heart.
The odd exegesis with which this article began provides a cautionary tale.  We do not have the liberty to “pick and choose in the Bible.”  It is all God’s Word and must be accepted as “inspired by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness” [2 Timothy 3:16].  If something seems to be unfortunate and embarrassing, that is almost certainly a sign that we are missing something and not understanding what it is really saying.  The Psalter contains many examples of holy hatred (as do the letters of Saint Paul—see for example 2 Corinthians 11:13f, Galatians 5:12, Philippians 3:2, 18f).  Let us imitate this holy hatred and reject decisively the wickedness that abounds in our world.  Such a wicked way may also lurk in our own thoughts and hearts.  Let us pray that God may search us and root it out.


Thanks to:

https://oca.org/reflections/fr.-lawrence-farley/holy-hatred

Sayings on our misfortunes ~ St. Maximus the Confessor

   A man of discernment, meditating on the healing Divine Providence, bears with thanksgiving the misfortunes that come to him. He sees their causes in his own sins, and not in anyone else. But a mindless man, when he sins and receives the punishment for it, considers the cause of his misfortune to be God, or people, not understanding God's care for him.


(St. Maximus the Confessor, Chapters on Love, 2.46)

thanks to:

http://orthodox.cn/patristics/300sayings_en.htm

Sayings on the path to happiness ~ St. Nektarius of Aegina

  Temptations come so that hidden passions may be revealed and so that it will be possible to fight them, and so that the soul may be rid of them. They are also a sign of God's mercy. So give yourself with trust into God's hands and ask his help, so that he will strengthen you in your struggle. God knows how much each one can bear and allows temptations according to the measure of our strength. Remember that after temptation comes spiritual joy, and that the Lord protects them that endure temptations and suffering for the sake of His love.


(St. Nektarius of Aegina, The Path to Happiness, 4)

thanks to:

http://orthodox.cn/patristics/300sayings_en.htm