Reviews

“My father wanted to serve.”

Hannie Bavinck, Herman Bavinck’s Daughter (235)

Change happens. During pandemics we shift from in-person to digital instruction, make our home our office, buy more books because libraries are closed, or find that maybe meetings – with people, around a table – were not so bad after all. We could learn a thing or two from Herman Bavinck, “An orthodox Calvinist trying to find his feet in the modern world” (287). Bavinck navigated internecine denominational battles, Nietzschean atheism, scientific progress, feminism, World War I, and the onset of modernism. Judging from James Eglinton’s Bavinck: A Critical Biography, his subject piloted well the cultural, political, worldview shoals of his day. Why should it be that one must find shifts difficult within life? We have need to acquire the trinitarian, adjectival strength of nimble, agile, and flexible. And Bavinck did pivot well in both his vocations and his writings. To his contemporaries, Bavinck was known not only as a brilliant theologian but a pioneer in psychology, a pedagogical reformer, a champion for girls’ education, an advocate of women’s voting rights, a parliamentarian, and a journalist (xvii).

Eglinton’s introduction should be read and reread as the “prolegomena” he calls it (xvii-xxii). Essential ideas lay a cinder block foundation. The “equipoise” (i.e. counterbalance) between “orthodoxy” and “modernity” created “tensions” structuring “nuances” toward “articulation,” Bavinck saw it all through the lens “of the historic Christian faith.” Bavinck’s commitment to “science” as the “higher forms of reflective knowledge” titles him a “polymath” who taught the Christian “intellectual tradition” as “distinctive,” the gateway through which the “creative thinker” became a “participant” in “culture.” Eglinton’s purpose statement summarizes “the story of a man whose theologically laced personal narrative explored the possibility of an orthodox life in a changing world.” A phrase pockmarked through the book, “the path from separation to integration” (16), is necessary to fully comprehend the continued work “to reconcile” one’s “orthodox tradition” within “the scientifically oriented academy” continually committed to working within “modern culture” (37).

Opening etchings catch the spirit of each chapter. For instance, “The modern youth has come under the influence of the modern society” (41) not only marks educational impacts on Bavinck but on anyone in any day, anywhere. Much could be said about the positive nature of a father’s influence in Eglinton’s part one. One wonders, reading the whole biography, if such an influence was manifest in Bavinck’s continued interest in what most refer to as “psychology.” Perhaps, better, we Christians should say the wholeness of the person. To that point, one cannot underestimate the impact of family. Part Two focuses on Bavinck’s schooling, its influences, paths, and trajectories. It was while he was in tutelage that Bavinck first encountered the virulent atheism, “dechristianization” that was sweeping Europe (79). Part Three, the shortest section, reveals Bavinck’s pastoral heartbeat within his professorial heart (Parts Four and Five). “Theology must be theologized” (original emphasis, 137) is the constant search for Professor Bavinck, for any biblical thinker who is given to theology as an “avenue of inquiry” in the same way “natural scientists depend on nature itself” (139).

Chapter nine is the epicenter of Eglinton’s book rightly introduced with Bavinck’s quote, “In reality there are only two worldviews” (219, 226). From Bavinck’s perspective, science should be thought about and taught by a decidedly Christian point of view. Nietzsche’s influence, however, “would shun Christianity entirely” (224-25). Bavinck’s commitment to scientific study is essential to understand his commitment to the world and The Word. Bavinck traversed cultural shifts (241), navigating rifts that were birthing gifts to a world in need of the God’s organizing order. Bavinck committed responses to Nietzschean atheism as well as those in The Church who had ventured into “uncharted, dechristianized waters” (226). Nietzsche’s worldview was in direct contradiction to Scriptural teaching necessitating “defenders of Christianity” (227). Gathering what Eglington calls a “theistic coalition” the author issues a clarion call for those of us in our own day. We need to demonstrate when a viewpoint has “rejected both the roots and fruits of Christianity.” Our “call on common history, texts, concepts, and moral values” necessitates a reinvestigation of our Christian beginnings, mining the veins of gold found early Christian apologetics.

Bavinck decided to concentrate on “uniting Christians” against the “Goliath” of a contradictory worldview (227). Responding to outside opposition, Bavinck made Christian education a centerpiece response. Publishing Christian Worldview, Christian Science, and Principles of Pedagogy in 1904, Bavinck saw the power of “Christianity’s explanatory power” providing “harmonious answers” to essential questions of any day (228). Focused on the Bible as God’s interpretation of His own world, Bavinck argued “that all human knowledge is subjective and rests on a priori assumptions” (139, 229).

“Without belief in revelation, he argued, it is impossible to have concepts of philosophy, nature, history, culture, or the future” showing that “the atheist constantly relies on theism” (246).

At the same time, he claimed that Christians recognize “the intellectual virtues of unbelievers” asking the same group for reciprocity based on “common grace.” Central to the Christian view of education – or it should be – is the teaching of human nature. “Created in the divine image but spoiled by sin” (230) has tremendous impact on educational outcomes. So, Bavinck promoted “a holistic, organicist vision of Christian education” a “distinctive articulation of educational theory along worldview lines” that would be

“a life-affirming Christian school curriculum [educating] children in religious knowledge, in skill in the use of language, and in the natural sciences, and that these should be taught in a way the engages the head, the heart, and the hands. In all of this, he mediated cutting-age developments in psychology and pedagogy” (230).

Applications abound in Eglinton’s work. Practicing our “scientific theology” might be best used in a public institution (99). The proliferation of doctoral degrees and the scant opportunity to use them in the university (100) seems not to be a new phenomenon. We must recreate a “tent-making” posture (Acts 18:3) while we find unique opportunities to practice our craft in a public academy (141) as Paul did “in the hall of Tyrannus” (Acts 19:8-10). We are all “pastors” to some degree, shepherding those around us. If we maintain Bavinck’s pastoral ethos, we begin to take a long-term view of relationships in the academe (122, 125). But we are given to viewing our books as our “true company” (133) knowing that our kinship is not only with the living but with the dead (120). The words “simple” and “practical” meeting “the needs of the day” should be our teaching commitment (139, 144); for example, we must employ our understanding of God’s immanence as the basis for our commitment to the poor (148). Bavinck’s “desire to apply Christ’s lordship across the entirety” of a curriculum should be ours (169) as he “insisted that the catholic Christian faith necessarily addresses every aspect of life in this world” (215). As with Bavinck, so with us, we must think carefully about “the starting point” of any “careful scholarship” (181). Our writing must participate in the conversation of the day (204-05).

All of us are bound by our times and spaces: God “having determined allotted periods and the boundaries of [our] dwelling place” (Acts 17:26). We are assigned our contexts to be the voice for a kairos moment (specific to area and age). The benefit for our world may have impact far beyond the reach of our brief lifetimes. Our trajectory may further the work of others beyond our own. Unbeknown to us, our witness in our day may take the form of our person or our personal work. If we are to be used, we must temper ourselves and our expectations. We may be given great position and prominence; or we may toil in obscurity. Both have their drawbacks. We operate within the framework of who we are, what we have been given, our opportunities under the Providences of God. Circumstances Providentially move us, even when, unbeknown to us, our life will change (176). We have been given a gift in James Eglinton’s Bavinck, far beyond what can be contained in this review. Herein we find an academician committed to the Christian worldview, writing across disciplines, serving the university, speaking to the needs of his day.

In Bavinck, we should find ourselves.

Bavinck: A critical biography. By James Eglinton. Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Academic. 2020. 450 pp. $45. hardcover. Review by Mark D. Eckel, President, The Comenius Institute, Indianapolis, IN; Professor of Leadership, Education and Discipleship, Capital Seminary and Graduate School, Lancaster, PA. To be published in an upcoming issue of Christian Education Journal.

“Misinformation” has become a term used by media outlets to detract from if not deny other points of view. National Public Radio, for instance, touts its “fact-based” reporting. Facebook has its “fact checkers” (see my comments on what happened to me from last week). The Washington Post has finally lifted the veil of “Democracy Dies in Darkness” as if we have now entered “the light.” And I continue to teach in the public university that says if you’re not hearing all sides of an issue you are not doing anything other than biased analysis.

This past week, for instance, I had my students watch an eight-minute video I created about “research” (you can watch it here). Among other principles I recited, these are five questions included in my presentation:

Could I be wrong?

Have I looked at all sides?

Am I broadminded?

Do my biases mislead?

Are my sources correct?

My questions run counter to the newly appropriated term “misinformation” acclaimed by “journalists” of our day. I use quotation marks not to denigrate the persons but wonder about the quality of their work. The latest calls to shut down Fox News, OAN, or Newsmax not to mention the outright removal of people’s opinions from social media (Kevin Sorbo’s Facebook page was removed without warning or specific reasoning which, by the way, was only reported at Fox News). My point here is not to defend the perspectives of these news groups or Mr. Sorbo. But I will always rise to stand for freedom of speech.

Enter 1984 and Dreher’s opening quotation in chapter six

Who controls the past, controls the future: who controls the present controls the past.

Dreher quotes Olga Rusanova who grew up in Siberia saying that the Soviet state “killed all the people who could remember history” (117). Yes, this chapter is about “cultural memory” (which I reviewed in part one of this series). But I would go a step farther. Again, from this week’s assignments in my “Argumentative Writing” class I recounted one of my mantras which I have been reciting for decades

Whoever controls the definition, controls the conversation.

Dreher references the problem as one of “ideological abuse of language” (119). I am witness to the abuse every week at the university. I hear it in the written assignments of my students who have obviously fallen under its spell from other professors. One young person this week suggested that her elderly grandparents (who watch Fox News) need to broaden their “conservative” perspectives. One of my comments on her paper was “Do you know any ‘progressives’ who need to do the same thing?”

Another video I created for my class is entitled “words” (you can watch it here). Some of my ideas in this review you can find there as well. Words are important because

Words have power. Words then shape the way we think. Words are necessary to interpret what we see. Words express our interpretation of the world. Words counteract the drive toward the visual alone. Words will always interpret our visual world.

So, what to do? I remember a crucial scene toward the end of the British film Fahrenheit 451 where numerous individuals are walking around a park reciting the books they have memorized. My memory of that scene was aroused when I read “create small fortresses of memory” (117). We, ourselves, become the bearers of books. “Sanctuary cities” (120) took on a whole new meaning for me – apart from our current cultural context about cities being open to illegal immigrants – when Dreher called for a “parallel polis“ whereby we could skirt the totalitarian effects of coercion. Looking “critically on what they’re reading and seeing” (125) is another way I combat the hostage taking of words. How often have I told my students over the years,

“I don’t want you to believe anything I tell you“?!

So I end this brief review of chapter six by positing sacrosanct biblical principles about teaching (written originally here):

As a Christian professor (one who professes Christian belief) I search for true Truth; I want the same for my students. So I pass out tools. I dedicate myself to a 5-fold Truth-search plan:

(1) assimilate true truth, explaining intentional doctrinal instruction (Psalm 119:160);

(2) discover truth, demonstrating ownership through self-study of Scripture (Acts 17:11);

(3) discern truth from untruth, exposing non-Christian beliefs (1 John 4:1-6);

(4) speak truth in love, practicing persuasion over confrontation (Colossians 4:5-6);

(5) apply truth in life, synthesizing biblical principles with all things (Romans 15:4)

As consumed as I am for true Truth, I am also consumed by training students to find true Truth for themselves.  My concern as a Christian educator is to help students become competent in what I call “the 5 ‘I’ words”:

 (1) identification of erroneous powers, premises, and practices;

(2) interpretation of pagan belief from a Christian perspective;

(3) inductive study of Scripture as a basis for assessment;

(4) interaction with current issues and icons, and

(5) investment in the tools necessary for students to make the search for true Truth a lifelong practice.

Picture credits: Snappygoat.com and Wikipedia

Sometimes people ask me what I post about without reservation on social media.

My response is always the same: I am unapologetically pro-life and pro-freedom.

I will make my voice heard on behalf of the unborn. I will make my voice heard on behalf of those who are enslaved. I will speak out against Planned Parenthood and their pro-death standards. I will speak out against Communist China and its subjugation of Hong Kong. My weapons are words. I am angered – even as I type these words on my keyboard – thinking that anyone would be politically oppressed because they had the audacity to want to speak freely.

Enter Gina Carano. The actress, fitness guru, and MMA fighting champion was recently fired by Disney. Why? She compared Jews being attacked by neighbors ahead of the Holocaust with Americans who are cancelled for their political views. Disney took offense and fired her. Let me say this up front: I don’t agree with her comparison. We are not at THAT moment in history (though I think it could be coming soon enough). But I do agree with her concern with “cancel culture” and I CERTAINLY agree with her right to say that “cancel culture” is a portent of things to come. [See her own comments here. Notice the word choices in a main stream media article like this: “controversial,” “politically charged,” and “conservative.” Are these words, or their opposite, used when a narrative from the progressive mindset is referenced? Simply, no.]

Dreher’s chapter five, “Value Nothing More Than Truth,” opens with Vaclav Havel and the famed “Greengrocer Essay” (97-98). The final lines of Havel’s piece should be etched in stone,

“He gives his freedom a concrete significance. His revolt is an attempt to live within the truth.”

Against those who dare to be free is the totalitarian system, no matter its name. Havel says the system’s “demoralization” is its greatest weapon (99). But with one of my heroes, Alexandre Solzhenitsyn, Dreher repeats the Russian proverb,

“One word of truth outweighs the whole world.”

What does it take, to take a stand? “Choice” and “resolve” (101). Yes, but how? Dreher entertains that remembering those who have sacrificed is essential (102). Plant gardens. Build monuments. Tell stories. Never forget. What else does it take, to take a stand? “Reduced expectations of worldly success” (103). Expected to be mocked, ridiculed. Expect to lose position because you won’t compromise. Moreover, “reject doublethink and fight for free speech” (103). It will cost you something (104) when accused for not following the party line, the accepted political structures. [Note, a list of Twitter accounts which have been frozen or eliminated altogether, including the national organization defending free speech, Speech First, here. See my own experience on Facebook in my review of Dreher’s chapter four.]

“Conscience” (105) is the weapon. Deciding that truth matters, will cost. “Prudence,” however, is to be measured along with freedom-loving stands. One must decide what can be done within the beliefs of what should be done (106). What act, what statement, what belief is worth losing everything: popularity, position, purse? The section ends with dissidents who know, who have lived the reduction of freedom

“Sometimes silence is an act of resistance. Keeping silent when you aren’t expected to be silent. That, too, is telling the truth” (107).

But, to me, the key statement is made by Dreher

“Refuse to let the media and institutions propagandize your children. Teach them how to identify lies and to refuse them” (108).

Wary of “rationalization” (ketman, see my chapter one review of Live Not By Lies), stand for those who cannot, speak for those who have been silenced, remember those who have sacrificed before, tell the story of free people, no matter the cost.

A biblical worldview is essential to combat the spread of lies, of cancel culture, of ending a person’s employment because they did not agree with you. Often, the only time we hear outrage about a person’s words is when those words go against the accepted narrative of the progressive culture. The biblical narrative runs counter to cancel culture with its focus on freedom within responsibility:

1. Political power (Deut 17:14-20; 1 Sam 8:10-18) suggests that leaders should be careful custodians of God-given authority.  Government should protect the freedom of individuals, with the fewest possible restrictions.  Limited administrative power prevents abuse of position.

2. In the New Testament, “authority” meant one had the ability to give orders (Matt 8.9), tell others what to do (Luke 7.8; 19.17), or submit to others’ authority (1 Pet 2.13). The Greek word for authority means “freedom of choice.” How much authority one has determines the amount of control one has over her life, and the lives of others. How one uses her authority is another issue. Jesus had authority to lay down his life of his own accord (John 10.17-18). Paul used his authority to build up not tear down (2 Cor 10.8; 13.10).
3. The Egyptian and Babylonian views of “time” emphasized a cyclical or circular view of history, leaving people at the mercy of perceived impersonal, whimsical, supernatural forces. The Hebrews, on the other hand believed in the personal, eternal creator giving folks meaning, potential, fulfillment, and a goal in life.  Each day is a new choice, opportunity, and responsibility with something and Someone to live for (Ecclesiastes 5:18-20).

 

Picture credits: Snappygoat.com, Gina Carano, By Gage Skidmore, CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=41633864. Vaclav Havel, By Kingkongphoto & www.celebrity-photos.com from Laurel Maryland, USA – VACLAC HAVEL, CC BY-SA 2.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=74769308

 

The first time you see it, your eyes go wide.

I wanted to share a YouTube video of one of my favorite scholars, Thomas Sowell. When I added the link to Facebook, a “Politi-Fact” box was superimposed across the screen. In no uncertain terms, I was told “Fact Checkers” would be reviewing this content, my participation with it, and that I may have my postings limited, or my page taken down, altogether.

Chills ran down my spine. Again, I was just posting a video about a Black scholar, Thomas Sowell. The video is a documentary made of his life, work, and beliefs. And my application of the video was about to be monitored. On February 8^th, 2021. I’m not sure if there is any more obvious connection to Rod Dreher’s fourth chapter on “Woke Capitalism.” One of the last sentences in his chapter says it all,

“Data harvesting and manipulation can and will be used by woke capitalists and social justice ideologues in institutional authority to impose control” (94).

If this statement, and my personal experience, is not unnerving, I’m not sure what might be more distressing in a free society. Dreher asks the question, “Can It Happen Here?” and the answer is “of course it can” (89). Just over the last week of January and the first week of February (2021), YouTube has demonetized The Epoch Times, Twitter has banned numerous conservative voices without warning, and Antifa critic Andy Ngo has had to move out of the country because of threats on his life. The New York Times, Washington Post, and National Public Radio are silent.

And if those news outlets are silent concerning conservatives (“perennial preservatist,” my definition from Part 3), we should not be surprised that a whole Muslim people group – the Uighurs – are being held in Chinese concentration camps without a word of concern from our major media outlets (84). [See an overview from PBS here, which is careful not to condemn.] Who will speak up?

“My students say they haven’t got time. . . . They’ve been perfectly manipulated by their education and the Party’s propaganda: my students devote their lives to consumerism and ignore everything else” (88).

Citizens neutralized (87) through a “techno-totalitarian state” (85) cannot depend upon laws for protection. “If the government is determined to take you out, it will manufacture a crime from the data it has captured, or otherwise deploy it to destroy your reputation” (83).

Another important question arises, “Who decides who crosses the line?” (80). “Harvested information” (79) will “manipulate the public” to reject a person like me who speaks out, who speaks up. How have we come to this place? Dreher highlights Shoshana Zuboff’s book The Age of Surveillance Capitalism concluding in her comment

“Once I was mine. Now I am theirs” (76-77).

And why have we allowed ourselves to be duped? “Convenience has overcome privacy concerns” (76). “Consumer expenditures [are a] part of creating a socially conscious personal brand identity” (75). “Corporate social responsibility” upended the attempted protection of religious freedom in my state of Indiana in 2015 (73). [The picture to the left is the front page of the Indianapolis Star against RFRA.] And where will the trend go from here? What happened in East Germany can happen in the United States of America.

“Citizens, with no prompting by the government, volunteered negative information about their friends and neighbors” (70)

Convenience, personal peace, and self-preservation is at the heart of neighbor-against-neighbor. Dreher begins his chapter with an interview with Eastern Europeans who lived under the hobnailed boot of Communism. The interviewee is aghast that Americans “are so gullible” when it comes to allowing a “commercial device” such as “Alexa” into their homes (69). I do not have “bugged” devices in my home, but my smart phone may be enough for nefarious actors to invade my life.

Which brings me back to my own personal experience up against a Facebook “Politi-Fact” check of a YouTube video about Thomas Sowell. Thomas Sowell is a “conservative” thinker as am I. If Facebook is warning against disseminating information about a conservative scholar whose views go against the accepted cultural narrative in February 2021, how long will this website – MarkEckel.com – be allowed to operate freely on “the net?”

A series of questions have always arisen from dissidents with divergent viewpoints:

1. Who watches the watchers?
2. Who are the faceless, nameless “Fact Checkers?”
3. What is the future of freedom?
4. How are cultural rules chosen, then dictated?

My last question is perhaps best addressed by George Orwell, in his introduction to Animal Farm,

“At any given moment there is an orthodoxy, a body of ideas of which it is assumed that all right-thinking people will accept without question. It is not exactly forbidden to say this, that, or the other, but it is “not done” to say it . . . Anyone who challenges the prevailing orthodoxy finds himself silenced with surprising effectiveness. A genuinely unfashionable opinion is almost never given a fair hearing, either in the popular press or in the high-brow periodicals.”

A few biblical principles round out some of my thinking on the subjects mentioned here.

1. Biblical commands demand the authority of multiple witnesses (Num 35:30, Deut 17:6, 19:15, 2 Cor 13:1, 1 Tim 5:19). Truth-telling matters in every human sphere, especially journalism, where what people read, they believe. Those who speak, write, and opine bear great responsibility.
2. All things should be considered. Every side of an issue should be fairly represented. Objectivity and accuracy is paramount.  Accusations against individuals should not be ascribed to “unnamed sources.” Witness and accused must confront each other. [Deut 19:15-18, Prov 18:17]
3. The camera can lie. Cropping a picture and framing a headline do the same thing–highlight the point of view of a journalist.  Here are some questions to ask: Who was behind the story?  Where was the story placed?  How much time or attention did it receive?  Who benefited and who was damaged by the story?  Perspective and prominence sway viewers and readers.  Instead of making someone look good, the journalist should give everyone a good look. [Gen 3:9-12; Ex 20:16, Prov 19:4-6]
4. Christian ethos is an attitude or disposition reflecting the way a person thinks about a matter (Rom 8:5-9; Gal 6:1). “The spirit of an age” (Eph 2:2; in German, zeitgeist) may come in various worldviews (pragmatism, utilitarianism, consumerism, individualism). An ethos can include “seducing spirits” (1 Tim 4:1). All spirits should be tested (1 John 4:1, 4, 6).
5. Jesus condemns the powerful elite of his day in Matthew 23:31-35 because they killed the prophets: from Abel through Zechariah.  Since Abel was killed by Cain in Genesis 4, the murdered “cry out to God” (Gen 4:10-11; Isa 26:21; Matt 23:31-35; Rev 6:10; Heb 12:24). In the end “the earth will disclose her blood and will no longer cover her slain” (Isa 26:21; Heb 12:24; 1 John 3:12-15).  But The Rider whose robe is dipped in blood will avenge all the Christ-following messengers, prophets, and wordsmiths returning to earth with Him (Rev 6:9-11; 19:14).

Progressivism: Intolerant Tolerance

My subtitle for teaching I was doing in 1996. [1]

The movie Dead Poets Society contributed to the belief. Robin Williams plays the progressive teacher in a boys school. In one scene he instructs the boys to tear out certain pages in their textbooks. “Be gone James Evans Pritchard, PhD!” is the war cry. Why were these pages targeted? The point of the scene and the whole film can best be summarized this way: what is “new” is always better than the “old.”

Dreher addressing “progress” takes the point a step further: “the future will inevitably be better than the present” (48, emphasis his). Who wants to oppose progress? Depending on the definition, no one wants to regress to the days before a Polio vaccine, unleaded gasoline, space satellites, or, dare I say it, smart phones. However, depending on who wields political power, “progress” may mean different things to different people.

Perhaps the most direct statement from Dreher defining “progress” appears on page 50:

“Classical liberals are more concerned with individual freedom, while leftists embrace equality of outcome.”

Dreher’s point, and the classic distinction between “conservatives” and “progressives,” is the last three words: “equality of outcome.” Conservatives, caring to preserve human ideals, agree with “equality of opportunity” not the “equality of outcome.” Why is this so important? Progressives desire control over definitions. Progressives want to mandate end results. Progressives want citizens to know that “science [is] the source of all authoritative knowledge” (52). Once the population is committed to technological “results,” the only “ends” they see are toward someone’s view of “progress.” [If you have not read or follow Thomas Sowell, begin now.]

“The Myth of Progress teaches that science and technology will empower individuals, unencumbered by limits imposed by religion and tradition, to realize their desires” (53).

It is easy to be a “progressive” in our current 21st century culture. Everyone from late night comedy hosts to sports figures to business people must perform obeisance to the latest form of “progress.” To be a “conservative” in our current 21st century culture means every utterance, performance, and public appearance must be guarded. Quoting Roger Scruton, Dreher says that conservatives are “heretics” to the progressive religion and so

“Everyone can join in the throwing of electronic stones at the scapegoat and never be held to account for it, because you don’t have to prove the accusation” (57).

For instance, it is acceptable to praise the results of the 2020 election while being careful to question the results of the 2016 election. “Thoughtcrimes” are identified by digital overseers. Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and YouTube accounts are being monitored, sometimes demonetized, sometimes, taken down altogether (see one example of the Epoch Times here).

For well-meaning folks, to be “progressive” in the 21st century means forward thinking, committed to change, and advocating improvement within political concerns. Large concerns within the movement include enhancement of women’s roles in government, broadening of ethnic participation in business board rooms, or public assistance by governmental structures for those needing financial assistance. [But it is not reported that in the 2020 election more ethnically diverse, politically conservative women were elected to the U.S. House of Representatives. Such a discovery does not coincide with the progressive narrative and so is unreported.] In fact, conservatives would agree to each of those initiatives. Conservatives would argue these initiatives come from an outside, “religious,” transcendent source of Truth. [2]

But Dreher argues that progressivism is “a rival religion” (54). And Dreher makes the clear connection to utopian doctrine: humans will bring a perfect world to earth (55). Indeed Dreher identifies key doctrines I was teaching in 1996 (note the copyright). I introduced high school seniors to the term “postmodernism.” [As you can see in the picture, I still have copies of the handouts.] The beliefs represented in a term that was all the rage in the 1990’s continues is progressivism today. The ancient origins have not changed: Genesis 3.

Listening to most news sources, one would think that being “conservative” means old, antiquated, or obstructionist. When I use the word “conservative” I mean I am a perennial preservatist. A perennial flower is a plant that blooms every year, year after year. My belief as a “perennial conservative” is that there are great ideas and ideals that God has embedded in His creation, in the world order, which continue to blossom, to bear fruit. A preservatist is a person who wants to guard those ideas and ideals, passing them on to the next generation.

To be a perennial preservatist – a “conservative” by my definition – is to care for equality of opportunity (known by economists like Thomas Sowell as “equity”). But if, as progressives demand, equality of outcome is the definition, socialism, communism, fascism, and totalitarianism in every form is sure to follow. For the Christian, here are some biblical foundations showing the important Scriptural foundation for “equity”:

1. Systems of justice (Gen 3; Deut 16-19; Isa 58-59) should maintain that the standard for justice is righteousness, setting precedence for fairness and equity. The possibility that good can be rewarded and evil punished exists because the transcendent source of Truth exists. Justice in human relations should eschew bribery and favoritism while encouraging consistency, mercy, and protection of the poor, weak and defenseless.
2. “Equity” or “equality of opportunity” (Deut 32:4; Ps 89:14; Lev 19:36; Deut 16:18) maintains that freedom of the individual is based upon inalienable rights, the source of which is the transcendent Creator of the universe.  Impartiality is established in the natural law of creation.  Justice for all people should be paramount.  However, equal opportunity is not the same as equality of outcome.  Distribution of resources fails to account for a fallen world with inevitable inequities and personal irresponsibility.
3. Giving to others from that which God has given (Acts 2:44-45; 4:34-37) is not Christian communism where a government imposes equality not equity.  The Greek word koinonia includes monetary gifts as “fellowship” as seen in Philippians 4:10-19.

[1] Just to be clear, D.A. Carson came up with his title 17 years after mine 🙂

[2] I would love to take a deep dive into politics but I need to comment on Rod Dreher’s third chapter in Live Not By Lies.]

An ongoing review of Rod Dreher’s book Live Not By Lies by Mark Eckel.

Picture credits: Luke Renoe, Wikipedia, SnappyGoat

Will you take the red pill or the blue pill?

In the movie The Matrix the traitor Cypher, played by Joe Pantoliano, is tired of fighting the machine culture. He longs for the simple pleasures of taste, what he missed when he lived in the reality created by machines. Cypher tires of the rebellion to fulfill his own personal appetites. Every rebellion has known its Cypher, the traitor, who would rather go back to living under totalitarian rule than endure the loss of ease. But the gain of ease comes at the loss of freedom.

Alexandre Solzhenitsyn warned his fellow countrymen of just such a loss of freedom. Live Not By Lies is a phrase taken from Alexandre Solzhenitsyn’s final speech to the Russian people before he became an émigré to the United States. Solzhenitsyn’s call then is just as applicable in our own day. Losing freedom has an impact both on individuals and institutions.

Of course, Karl Marx preached that the Russian people were being duped by another kind of tyrant: religion. Dreher uses religious words like “missionaries,” “evangelists,” and “zealots” (24-25, 29) to convey that Marx’s views were just another worldview. First in the line of religious Marxist workers were the “intelligentsia,” professors in universities (41-43). The teachers used language to communicate Marxist doctrine to students, then to the workers, moving the Russian Revolution into every home and workplace (26). The belief system began with an idea, supported by words, carried by instructors, seeded into students, and finally spreading its views throughout the whole Russian system. The Matrix message of systemic control is easy to see in any totalitarian takeover.

And it is easy to see how some become traitors and submit to a dictatorial system. Dreher quotes historian Anne Applebaum, saying people conformed to the system because they “succumbed to the constant, all-encompassing, everyday psychological and economic pressure” (28).

To explain the process Dreher relies on Hannah Arendt’s classic The Origins of Totalitarianism. Arendt notes the following conditions that allowed authoritarianism to spread: (1) Loneliness and social atomization, (2) loss of faith in institutions, (3) desire for deviance and destruction, (4) willingness to believe propaganda and lies, (5) politicized ideologies, and (6) loyalty over expertise (30-41).

Now notice what has been lost. My list of loss corresponds to Arendt’s six conditions: (1) community, (2) purpose, (3) church, (4) reportage, (5) persons, and (6) standards. Every belief system pushes out other beliefs that are antithetic to its own. The question that remains for free peoples is whether or not they will push back against what they are losing instead of accepting the personal pleasures of acceptance.

Becoming a traitor has immediate benefits: power, position, prestige, and purse. But it is the long-term implications of freedom’s loss that liberty loving individuals will fight for. Live Not By Lies outlines the losses some are willing to accept. But one belief is always replaced by another. [In Part 3 of my review I will address the new religion: “progressivism.”] A Scriptural philosophy of communication begins an antidote to exchanging the truth for a lie:

Truth is essential for communication. When God spoke creation into being, His character of integrity, trustworthiness and faithfulness was displayed (Ps 102:25-27; 119:89-96; 1 Pet 4:19). Truth is reliable because God is reliable. Truth corresponds with fact and reality. So, truthfulness is part and parcel of speech. When we speak, we should be honest, genuine, objective, dependable and impartial. We should stop lying, bias, double talk, misrepresentation, half-truths, exploitation, withholding information, or “playing up” one point of view while ignoring others.

Ideas are captive to words. The creation was perfect; everything was “very good” (Gen 1:31).  God’s words were fitted with exact intention (Ps 12:6). Frustration arises when we “know what we mean but can’t put it into words.”  We should focus on exactitude and clarity in our rhetoric, avoiding error. We should say what we mean and mean what we say.

Biblical commands demand the authority of multiple witnesses (Num 35:30, Deut 17:6, 19:15, 2 Cor 13:1, 1 Tim 5:19). Truth-telling matters in every human sphere, especially journalism, where what people read, they believe. Those who speak, write, and opine bear great responsibility.

It Could Happen Here.

 

When I was growing up, there was a great concern about nuclear war between the United States and the former Soviet Union (U.S.S.R.). The threats were real. At the same time, I was reading snippets of Fox’s Book of Martyrs and stories from the tortured-for-his-faith Richard Wurmbrand. I began to read Church history, noting what Christian thinkers were saying in response to Roman persecution of Christians through the early centuries of Christendom. I became an advocate for an organization dedicated to helping persecuted Christians, “The Voice of the Martyrs.” In 2004, I gave an address as a professor at Moody Bible Institute on a Christian response to persecution. I have followed the impact of Christian persecution around the world, notably in The Black Book of Communism. My approach to knowledge is as an academic. “Fearmonger” is not my mindset. However, I believe in being prepared.

There is a difference between running around the barnyard yelling, “The sky is falling! The sky is falling!” and putting a roof over your head.

Preparation never hurt anyone. I’m not thinking in terms of “Y2K” preparation. [For those unaware there was a certain hysteria among some about what would happen to computer systems not digitally ready for the change to the 21^st century. Do a Bing search for background.]

No, preparation is a positive step toward holding in tension what we know about our present time, what we have studied from our past, and the possibilities of a future. Everyone who watches science fiction shows about zombies knows they are not real; but then a pandemic hits the world and . . .

Immediately in his introduction, Dreher quotes Alexandre Solzhenitsyn:

There always is this fallacious belief: “It would not be the same here; here such things are impossible.” Alas, all the evil of the twentieth century is possible everywhere on earth (ix).

Americans tend to have short attention spans and learn their history from Hollywood movies. We forget what one individual said, especially if that person has power and powerful friends who can hide their actions. One news important news item can be swept away soon after it is reported. Think Jeffrey Epstein and his perversions and how Epstein drew powerful people into his orbit. But those folks are no longer in the news.

Rod Dreher strikes the right tone in his book Live Not By Lies: A Manual for Christian Dissidents Dreher does the hard work of talking with others who have actually lived through the horrors of totalitarian rule. [When I use the word “totalitarian” I refer to any group, political party, or dictator who usurps control of a nation. Take a few moments to acquaint yourselves with names such as Vladimir Lenin, Joseph Stalin, Adolf Hitler, Mao Zedong, Fidel Castro, Pol Pot, Idi Amin, to name just a few famous tyrrants from the 20^th century.]

Dreher’s first chapter commemorates the life of Father Kolaković comparing his suffering under Communist rule in Slovakia during the Soviet despotism. Kolaković’s warning to his people prepared many for what was to come. Dreher makes the connection to our own day by focusing on “soft totalitarianism” stressing that the loss of freedom comes in many forms. Dreher’s reportage on pages 14-17 should send chills up our collective spines. Freedoms can be easily lost by neglecting what we know to be true, becoming decadent in our ease of life, or failing to speak out against lies. Czeslaw Milosz, one of my favorite poets, warns of practicing ketman: thinking that one can outwardly conform to a culture while not believing the lies. Milosz reports that such attempts at outward deception only conform the person to the governing culture of the day. Or in Paul’s words “Be not conformed” (Rom 12:1).

Memory is our first line of defense against conforming to our culture. Hearing the words of those who have lived before us reminds us of how we must remember the past to properly live in the present. I have recorded here some important biblical statements about the importance of memory.

1. Memory is essential. “Forgetfulness” in the Bible was often seen as an act of rebellion, an ethical choice to reject God (2 Pet 3:5). Self-satisfaction causes “forgetfulness” (Isa 51: 13; Hosea 13:6). It does not take long to “forget” (Ps 106:13). It takes effort to “remember” (2 Pet 1:12-15; 3:2, 8).
2. Three times in Deuteronomy 8:11-20 God’s people are commanded not to ignore their Maker. Implied in the passage is the process of “forgetting God”: apathy, leads to pride, ultimately resulting in idolatry. “Being too full of oneself” begins the downward slide, disregarding the Almighty (Hosea 13:6) which seems to take very little time (Ps 106:13).  Ezekiel 16:43-63 explains the outcomes of the active choice of memory deficiency, one of which is the need to fear others (Isa 51:13).
3. One antidote to forgetfulness is activity. The Sabbath is a “sign” (Ezek 20:12, 20) practiced now through community celebration of Jesus’ resurrection (1 Cor 15:54-16:2).  Feasts (Est 9:27-28), stones (Josh 4:7), tassels (Num 15:39-40), table tops (Num 16:36-40), and repositories for Scripture (Deut 11:18) were the premise for active reminders through monuments, holidays, and medallions of our day.  We “make” history live again by singing, pledging, bowing, eating, and drinking with gratefulness to God for who He is and what He has done.

Part 2 of my review of Live Not By Lies coming later this week.