Ben Witherington distills the important distinctions between these concepts from a new book about Constantine that are completely confused in modern understanding:
The paradigm distinguishes between forbearance, tolerance, and concord, with Leithart suggesting that ultimately and in the end Constantine’s practice tended towards the latter of these three. Forbearance is a mere pragmatic policy not guided by moral principle, and when the going got rough politically, it could give way to a policy of persecution.
Toleration by contrast involves a moral principle such as the notion that a person’s religious views cannot or should not be coerced in some particular direction by civic authorities. Note however that ‘toleration’ on this model does not mean equality and does not mean acceptance. I stress this because too often the term ‘toleration’ in modern American discourse does not mean what the dictionary say toleration means, namely an unwillingness to take action against something you disapprove of and disagree with because you think suppression of it is a violation of some religious right or privilege. Toleration means toleration, putting up with, not consent or approval. In modern American discourse the term has come to mean something else entirely and something more than ‘live and let live’. Tolerance whether in political or ethical or theological debates on hot topics is often a buzz word for ‘acceptance of something as legitimate as a viable moral option’. This is particularly true in the homosexuality debate, but also in other current debates as well.
The third, and most important category when it comes to Constantine is ‘concord’. Concord is a policy in which by treating some one or some group with forbearance and tolerance you believe you are creating an ethos or certain conditions under which the one’s tolerated may see the light and freely change their behavior, in this case to what the State expects. Leithart stresses that this third approach is in fact what was Constantine’s policy.
This explains why on the one hand he clearly favored Christianity, constructed many churches, and even banned pagan sacrifice in some limited situations and senses (which btw is banned today as well in most States in tolerant politically correct America as well) but on the other hand, Constantine did not tear down all pagan shrines, forbid various forms of pagan worship, nor did he withdraw all funding from the same.
The idea isn't necessarily to recommend Constantine's approach in our time, but to correctly understand the differences as they apply to living together in the public square. We don't have to sacrifice our Christians convictions or submit to a modern notions of relativism and postmodernism in order to have a civil dialog about religion in our society.
(I apologize for the length of this)
I would offer that the public square ought to belong to all of us. Hence a true Theocracy would lead us to an end result of brute force, as seen in some religions, or to a politicized faith, which, in every experiment in the past, has led to violence.
I think this goes both ways. Those of faith have, and can, and do, steel away the Lives or Rights or Honor or Worth of others simply to “build the kingdom”. And this extreme can go the other way too as we have painfully witnessed the bloodiest century in history with the hundreds of millions lost in the last 100 years to the wars of the Nietzschean, Atheistic/Secular hopes of Stalin, Mao, Pol Pot, Hilter, Idi Amin, Lennon, and others. With the birth of Nietzsche's Super-Man and the death of God we've seen the birth of the vulgar and the violent. As one secularist commented, "If God is dead, and he is, then something must take his place. It will inevitably be Heffner and Hitler, the Phallus and the Fist."
I offer that human relations on all levels have borne this out in a public square that is not embracing of all of us.
I think this business of “coming out on top” every time, or in every discussion, hurts us, as our goal should not be to win, but to mirror. For me, offering views, while at the same time being able to make the believable statement, “I am meek and humble” isn’t something I’ve been able to pull off. I have met a few people and had a few discussions wherein the person I spoke with had this kind of bi-level effectiveness, on the one hand presenting a strong, solid, well delineated presentation, and on the other hand having a manner or air about them of genuine, or innate, meekness, as if having to lead you into the error of your thinking was almost more painful for them than for you. I’m not one of “those”, although I wish I were.
I like to win. And I trust too much in what is built by our own hands; rather than in His Work within the hearts of men.
But I think Jesus was “one of those”, and this quote by CS Lewis shows us Jesus functioning in the public square as, I feel, only He can, and I think we error to try to copy it. The closest we can come (maybe?) is to be one of “those” as mentioned above.
CS Lewis in this quote states that “Christ says that He is ‘humble and meek’ and we believe Him”. I think that is a proper goal for us “out there in teh public square” regardless of who wins the argument. For what it’s worth here’s the quote from Mere Christianity, as it shows us what it is we are presenting to the world, and ought not compromise, and also shows us Him presenting it, and then stating that He is meek and humble, and it reminds us that the people of his day actually believed Him on this point:
“Then comes the real shock. Among these Jews there suddenly turns up a man who goes about talking as if He was God. He claims to forgive sins. He says He has always existed. He says He is coming to judge the world at the end of time. Now let us get this clear. Among Pantheists, like the Indians, anyone might say that he was a part of God, or one with God: there would he nothing very odd about it. But this man, since He was a Jew, could not mean that kind of God. God, in their language, meant the Being outside the world, who had made it and was infinitely different from anything else. And when you have grasped that. you will see that what this man said was, quite simply, the most shocking thing that has ever been uttered by human lips.
One part of the claim tends to slip past us unnoticed because we have heard it so often that we no longer see what it amounts to. I mean the claim to forgive sins: any sins. Now unless the speaker is God, this is really so preposterous as to be comic. We can all understand how a man forgives offences against himself. You tread on my toes and I forgive you, you steal my money and I forgive you. But what should we make of a man, himself un-robbed and un-trodden on, who announced that he forgave you for treading on other men’s toes and stealing other men’s money?
Asinine fatuity is the kindest description we should give of his conduct. Yet this is what Jesus did. He told people that their sins were forgiven, and never waited to consult all the other people whom their sins had undoubtedly injured. He unhesitatingly behaved as if He was the party chiefly concerned, the person chiefly offended in all offences. This makes sense only if He really was the God whose laws are broken and whose love is wounded in every sin. In the mouth of any speaker who is not God, these words would imply what I can only regard as a silliness and conceit unrivalled by any other character in history.
Yet (and this is the strange, significant thing) even His enemies, when they read the Gospels, do not usually get the impression of silliness and conceit. Still less do unprejudiced readers. Christ says that He is ‘humble and meek’ and we believe Him; not noticing that, if He were merely a man, humility and meekness are the very last characteristics we could attribute to some of His sayings.
I am trying here to prevent anyone saying the really foolish thing that people often say about Him: ‘I’m ready to accept Jesus as a great moral teacher, but I don’t accept His claim to be God.’ That is the one thing we must not say. A man who was merely a man and said the sort of things Jesus said would not be a great moral teacher. He would either be a lunatic—on a level with the man who says he is a poached egg—or else he would be the Devil of Hell. You must make your choice. Either this man was, and is, the Son of God: or else a madman or something worse. You can shut Him up for a fool, you can spit at Him and kill Him as a demon; or you can fall at His feet and call Him Lord and God. But let us not come with any patronizing nonsense about His being a great human teacher. He has not left that open to us. He did not intend to.”
C.S. Lewis, Mere Christianity (1952; Harper Collins: 2001) 51-52.
Posted by: LoveHimselfRescuedMe | April 28, 2011 at 11:51 AM
Melinda,
I think my post focused on how it is we ought to "opperate within" the Public Square on a personal level. I'm not always successful, but two things seem to help; I find that if a felt sense of brokenness and a felt sense of actual love for the audience is present then that seems to translate into a felt-reality on their part. If I'm careful to seperate (and make known) a real honor for their Person and Worth from my own disagreement with their Action or Posited Framework, then it seems to keep doors open.
I think your essay is more along the lines (maybe) of a more society/civil level rather than a personal one-on-one level. I'm not sure how the world will act in the public square: I've not been impressed thus far and I think your description of the present pathology is accurate.
So, to take it futher, how should we who follow Christ act on the world stage and still be faithful to Christ and His example? He seemed more interested in Another-Kingdom than in Rome or Pilot to me. I found an essay titled "Why I'm Not A Passivest" by CS Lewis helpful here. Where is the line of any sort of "We" against any sort of "Them" and can there even be such a line if we are to follow Christ, and how can we frame any such potential interaction without going outside of Christ's own example etc. is touched on. I'm not sure I agree with all of it, but it moves across the spectrum all the way from "bearing one another's short commings" over into the very present need in this sort of a world for police or an army and that sort of thing, and he touches on all of that in a balanced way.
There's a fine, and easily crossed line, in all of that, but I think if a man is full of the love of God, and full of faith in His Kingdom being built in the hearts of men rather than in what can be built with our own hands, then when the world asks of us the same misguided question it asked of Jesus, "When will you overthrow Rome and restore the Kingdom" we can answer as Christ answered, and really mean it, and, yet, still bring healing to the world's structure both internally and externally.
But it's a fine line; and one easily crossed. We can't be accountable for "their" treatment of folks in the public square, but we can be accountable for ours. Christ aims for the heart, and changes the world. We can do the same perhaps.
Posted by: LHRM | April 28, 2011 at 08:37 PM
Forgot to mention: "Why I am not a Pacifist" is (I believe) in a book of essays called, "The Weight Of Glory".
Posted by: LHRM | April 28, 2011 at 08:52 PM
Who was it that said: "Brevity is the soul of wit"?
Then, again, it says in Pro 10:19 When there are many words, transgression is unavoidable, But he who restrains his lips is wise.
My High School teacher would always exhort us about saying the most with the fewest words, indicating that no true sentiment needs a voluminous explanation unless we are still unclear about it ourselves.
The very first paragraph of the initial post was succinct enough.
Posted by: Oscar | April 29, 2011 at 07:56 AM
HA True! But, as the posts are few (actually none) I thought I'd roll on along for fun to fill the air and await whatever echo may return ~~~~
Posted by: LHRM | April 29, 2011 at 01:01 PM
Who said you 'have to sacrifice your Christian convictions' and/or 'submit to modern notions of relativism and postmodernism' to 'have a civil dialog about religion in our society'?
Alternatively, who's done one of these things for this purpose?
RonH
Posted by: RonH | May 01, 2011 at 07:57 AM
RonH is that an echo I hear!
Well, I think the hatchet goes both ways, sometimes by our own hands perhaps.
In Dirction A:
I know of several professors who have posited concepts based on various data sets. And these in very open and public, and ad-lib forums without any compulsion to attend. One dealt with intelligent design, one with panspermia, one positing "It's all good" in a literal yet extreme fashion (you name the act, he offered it is good if it is good to you and defended child rape as a means to sexualize the child early so they dont' grow up with "hang-ups" about sex), one presented a theory dealing with the benefits of terrorism to tame america, and one dealing with something I dont' recall, was it bending light rays or something?
All but one of those professors was still employed six months later. I'll leave it to you to guess which one was not, as you ALMOST suggested that no one has needed to be "subjected or submitted to" non-civil treatment merely for presening ideas in a very public and open ended forum. The Christian who use to (used to? I can never keep that straight) burn witches is now in the fire perhaps. Two wrongs, apparently, make a right.
Direction B: The Christian [and I mention him specifically as only he has world veiw in which the statement "the ultimate ethic is love" maintains intellectual coherency] is often sacrificing his own faith in the public arena. By this I mean he willingly moves to transgress a moral line due to some drive to come out on top, or win, or whatever. All of that "ego stuff" comes in here and by his own hand he is "subjected" to a different sort of tyrant: that of his Old Nature.
I think both of these "directions" are unfortunate, and I have seen both, or rather all, sides play the role of tyrant, as that Death of Self is not easy to mirror. But if Love matters at all, or rather if it matters ultimately, then there it is for us to follow, or rather for us to become.
Posted by: LoveHimselfRescuedMe | May 02, 2011 at 02:49 PM
Although I wouldn't say it in the same way, LHRM has hit the nail squarely on the head, and is in touch with reality for anyone who has eyes to see and ears that hear. For those who are deaf and dumb, he speaks foolishness.
Posted by: Brad B | May 02, 2011 at 03:54 PM
To clarify my poorly written thought:
I wrote, "But if Love matters at all, or rather if it matters ultimately, then there it is for us to follow, or rather for us to become."
I mean by that something more like this:
If Love matters, not now, not merely in our wishes, but matters ultimately, and does, as Christ, and Christ alone, tells us, outlast all, and is thereby truly the ultimate ethic, then it, or Him, or Love Himself, is there for us not so much to follow, but, it is said, for us to become, or to become one-with.
Posted by: LoveHimselfRescuedMe | May 04, 2011 at 08:52 AM