I recently started reading The Politics of Jesus, by John Howard Yoder. It is a recognized theological classic, having been published in 1972.
The book makes a power case for Christian pacifism. As Americans, this is a tough sell. I recall attending a religious conference (“Baptist Fundamentalism ’84”) at the Washington Conventional Center. During US President Reagan’s speech, a group of protesters stood up, unfurled a banner and began chanting the message on the banner… “Bread Not Bombs! Bread Not Bombs!” According to my friends who were sitting close to action, as the protesters were dragged away, Christians in the crowd were insulting them and spitting on them. Thankfully there was no crown of thorns or cross to make the irony complete.
The book, although on political theology, focuses strongly on ethics, or the ethics of Jesus. Yoder notes that many or most Christians tend to value the words of Jesus while devaluing much of His ethics. Yoder suggests 6 theological arguments that some have used as why Christians can ignore the ethical statements of Jesus.
A. Jesus provided a political ethic of the transient. Jesus thought that the end of the age was coming really really soon. Therefore, the ethical standards that He set, such as in the Sermon on the Mount— those that seem so impractical— are fine for the short period of time they were supposed to be lived out.
B. Jesus was a man of the farmlands. As such His ethic may make sense in small communities but cannot be applied in the world of great cities and empires.
C. Jesus was speaking to people who were powerless, and He presumed that they would always be powerless. He simply did not address how the people who wield power should behave.
D. Jesus was a philosopher and mystic. As such, He was concerned with spiritual things, and His talk about mundane actions and language must be seen as more symbolic than literal.
E. Jesus believed in doing the will of the Father, but the will of One who is so completely Other cannot be boiled down to a fully intelligible ethic. This relativizes all human values. <This is the one that I am not quite sure I understand. Perhaps the unknowable-ness of God leads to a God-based ethic being mystery and so the words of Jesus cannot be taken too seriously because they point to something so far beyond what we can fathom.>
F. Jesus really came to save— an act of atonement for our sins. If that is why He came, that really should be our focus, and not get too focused on ethics. After all, why should we focus on issues of sin when Jesus came to eradicate the eternal consequences of sin?
I don’t think it is hard to tear down any single one of these. But their strengths are not primarily in their intellectual weight, but in their emotional comfort. We don’t feel bad for our lives not aligning with the words of Jesus because (PICK ANY OF THE SIX).
I found this list interesting not only because it gave some things that I have heard before, but also because of who came up with list. John Howard Yoder was a great and influential Anabaptist theologian. He was also one who appeared to fail miserably in some ethical areas. Late in life, he faced charges of sexual misconduct in the academic field with women, using his position of power in school. I am not an expert on these charges but it is generally agreed that they have merit. Yoder does not appear to have ever fully accepted responsibility.
One might discount everything he says because of this. I would blame no one for doing that. For me, I wonder if it actually shows his capabilities in ethics (in a very twisted ways). Knowing how people twist ethics for their own advantage gives an ethicist the ability to do the same when it suits them. It allowed Ravi Zaccharias to come up with clever arguments for his sexual misconduct. In my mind (controversial take coming) it allowed Norman Geisler to overlook some deep moral concerns and promote a politician who was linked to his own form of partisanship.
I am not complimenting Yoder in this. It is a warning of sorts. Knowing how to rationalize makes one better at rationalizing. I can easily struggle with this as well. Some people will take a plain text statement of Christ or Paul or Peter or someone else and say that it is a rule that we must just straightforward be followed fully. I want to jump in and point out that Biblical ethics is not simply deontological, but it is also teleological and contextual. Additionally, the statement is embedded canonically and as such must be clarified in its broader Scriptural context. And I would be right (I believe). But one can use those insights improperly to undermine the basic statement. This is something that I have to watch out for in myself.
And since we are socially embedded, we also need to talk to each other to help us understand our relationship with God’s Word. If this sounds too vague… I get it. I am attacking ethical gymnastics while, at the same time, giving permission to do exactly that.
It is necessary sometimes. Yoder speaks of the book “In His Steps” by Charles Sheldon, where we get the phrase “What Would Jesus Do?” Yoder notes that in the book, there is not, however, an actual call to do what Jesus says we should do. Rather, it is a call to “Do what is right even when it is uncomfortable.” However, in practice, the “right” is what is seen right in late 1800s Protestant America. A challenge in following the ethics of Jesus is our tendency to reframe it as doing what is okay according to our societal norms. And again, I have said that I believe that ethics has a contextual element to it. That contextual element should give nuance to the original, not replace it.
