Redefining courage. (Jesus, ritual, punishment, choice, evolution)

[doppelgänger]

The following is from Clarence Darrow in his debate "On the Theory of Non-Resistance To Evil" with Arthur Morrow Lewis. As the debate wore on, Darrow turned charges that non-violence elevated the weak on their head:

Those who think that nonreistance is a milk-and-water theory have got another guess. It is not. I was talking the other day with a man who had been a colonel in the war. I said: "I do not know how you could get up the courage to go up on the face of cannons and bayonets and take your life in your own hands." He says: "I did it, because I was too big a coward to run away." ANd that is why most all men go to war. They are too big cowards to stay at home. That is why men fight. They are too big cowards not to fight. Do you think it is a brave man who fights; or is it the brave man who does not fight? I will show you ten thousand men who are willing to group in the face of hostile cannon, where you cannot find one man who will take on stick of criticism in a daily newspaper . . . Can you cure hatred with hatred? Everybody knows it in their own life. You may force men against their will to do certain things, but their heart is still a seething mass waiting for a time when they may accomplish other things by violence. Do you think you can do something for a man by sending him to penitentiary? Gentleness is the law that makes life. Cruelty and hatred and coldness is the law that makes death. The question of nonresistance or resistance means a choice between those two laws.

What do you think of Darrow's vision of courage and the dichotomy of the law of life and the law of death. Is Darrow, a devout agnostic and dedicated non-Christian, giving an argument along the same lines as that in chapters 7 and 8 of Paul's Epistle to the Romans?

[doppelgänger]

And of revolution (Darrow was frequently accused of being a "communist," which he wasn't) Darrow cautions:

Do you think if you stood society on its head, and gave them [the working class] the guns, that all would be peace and harmony and loveliness; and that we would then practice nonaggression, if not nonresistance? No. . . . My friend is wrong when he says that all strife comes from capitalism. It lurks in the human heart. It is part of the savage. It is in the beast, from there to a man.

[lunamoth]

doppelganger wrote:

Gentleness is the law that makes life. Cruelty and hatred and coldness is the law that makes death. The question of nonresistance or resistance means a choice between those two laws.
What do you think of Darrow's vision of courage and the dichotomy of the law of life and the law of death. Is Darrow, n devout agnostic and dedicated non-Christian, giving an argument along the same lines as that in chapters 7 and 8 of Paul's Epistle to the Romans?

luna says:
Yes I think the practical argument is similar, related. But Paul is explicit that the way we choose the law of life is through Christ, His sacrifice and His love. It could be that those who choose the law of life are, in effect, choosing Christ as well, but I'm not sure Darrow would accept that.


Paul worte:
But now, by dying to what once bound us, we have been released from the law so that we serve in the new way of the Spirit, and not in the old way of the written code. (Romans 7:6)

5Those who live according to the sinful nature have their minds set on what that nature desires; but those who live in accordance with the Spirit have their minds set on what the Spirit desires. 6The mind of sinful man[e] is death, but the mind controlled by the Spirit is life and peace; 7the sinful mind[f] is hostile to God. It does not submit to God's law, nor can it do so. 8Those controlled by the sinful nature cannot please God.
9You, however, are controlled not by the sinful nature but by the Spirit, if the Spirit of God lives in you. And if anyone does not have the Spirit of Christ, he does not belong to Christ. 10But if Christ is in you, your body is dead because of sin, yet your spirit is alive because of righteousness. 11And if the Spirit of him who raised Jesus from the dead is living in you, he who raised Christ from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through his Spirit, who lives in you.
12Therefore, brothers, we have an obligation—but it is not to the sinful nature, to live according to it. 13For if you live according to the sinful nature, you will die; but if by the Spirit you put to death the misdeeds of the body, you will live, 14because those who are led by the Spirit of God are sons of God. 15For you did not receive a spirit that makes you a slave again to fear, but you received the Spirit of sonship.[g] And by him we cry, "Abba,[h] Father." 16The Spirit himself testifies with our spirit that we are God's children. 17Now if we are children, then we are heirs—heirs of God and co-heirs with Christ, if indeed we share in his sufferings in order that we may also share in his glory. (Romans 8)

35Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall trouble or hardship or persecution or famine or nakedness or danger or sword? 36As it is written:
"For your sake we face death all day long;
we are considered as sheep to be slaughtered."[l] 37No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. 38For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons,[m] neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, 39neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord. (Romans 8)

[doppelgänger]

Originally Posted by lunamoth

luna says:
Yes I think the practical argument is similar, related. But Paul is explicit that the way we choose the law of life is through Christ, His sacrifice and His love.

Christ the person? Or the sacrifice and love of Christ? If the latter, isn't that the same thing as the nonresistance that Darrow is talking about?

How do we know for sure which one is really what Paul is talking about - the "Christ" or the meaning of the "Christ"?

[lunamoth]

Originally Posted by doppelgänger

Christ the person? Or the sacrifice and love of Christ?

They are the same.

If the latter, isn't that the same thing as the nonresistance that Darrow is talking about?

As I said, practically speaking they are similar. Darrow is speaking only of non-resistance which I think is a bit more limited than the freedom Paul is talking about. I said that I was not sure Darrow would accept that because many people do not like having their ideas reframed in religious/spiritual overtones.

How do we know for sure which one is really what Paul is talking about - the "Christ" or the meaning of the "Christ"?

Does it matter?

[doppelgänger]

Originally Posted by lunamoth

They are the same.

As I said, practically speaking they are similar. Darrow is speaking only of non-resistance which I think is a bit more limited than the freedom Paul is talking about. I said that I was not sure Darrow would accept that because many people do not like having their ideas reframed in religious/spiritual overtones.

He wouldn't. But I don't think I was doing that. Really, I was more intrigued by the possibility of stripping the religious/spiritual overtones out of Paul and delve into the meaning of his concept of the law of sin/law of life.

Regarding Darrow, during the debate he specifically challenges Lewis for likening Darrow's concept of nonresistence to Christianity (again, note, that's not what I am proposing):

He tells you this is the Christian doctrine that I am teaching. I wish it was. That is, I wish the Christian doctrine was this doctrine. Did you ever a preacher who preached it? Did you ever of an othorodox preacher who woul dnot let go of the church before the jail? Would they give up punishment? Would they give up force? Don't they love the penitentiary more than the chapel? . . . It is not the doctrine of the Christian church at all. It is the opposite. But if it is not the doctrine of the Christian church, niether is it the doctrine of China or Japan, except for a few of the wise, and great, and good, who there, as everywhere, saw what the rules of the world have never seen, who felt what the cruel have never felt, whose minds had the imagination to feel the suffereings of their fellowmen, whose hearts were so tender as to make them feel the heart throbs of the weak and the poor, and the suffering.

My point is that Darrow and Paul are of a mind. And that mind is much deeper, much older, and much more powerful than any image. Even "the Christ."

[lunamoth]

Originally Posted by Darrow

He tells you this is the Christian doctrine that I am teaching. I wish it was. That is, I wish the Christian doctrine was this doctrine. Did you ever a preacher who preached it? Did you ever of an othorodox preacher who woul dnot let go of the church before the jail? Would they give up punishment? Would they give up force? Don't they love the penitentiary more than the chapel? . . . It is not the doctrine of the Christian church at all. It is the opposite. But if it is not the doctrine of the Christian church, niether is it the doctrine of China or Japan, except for a few of the wise, and great, and good, who there, as everywhere, saw what the rules of the world have never seen, who felt what the cruel have never felt, whose minds had the imagination to feel the suffereings of their fellowmen, whose hearts were so tender as to make them feel the heart throbs of the weak and the poor, and the suffering.

If by doctrine he means teaching, then Darrow is incorrect above because even as you point out it is very much a Christian teaching. Just because fallible humans, fallible Christians, lose sight of this does not mean it is not a Christian teaching.

2c,
luna