Just before leaving for a long,weekend trip to Ft. Mountain State Park with Yasuko on Sunday I happened to pick up (on cable) Charles Stanley of Atlanta First Baptist talking about the Bible and seeking to engender respect for it. He indicated that some scholars are beginning to doubt some portions of this book, but that these "experts" do not agree among themselves as to which parts are correct and which are incorrect. His conclusion: if you assert that any portion is not correct, then your whole basis of certitude with regard to your behavior is lost, for how can you know what it is that you are supposed to do?

But the answer is so terribly simple, but beyond the grasp of Rev. Stanley for the simple reason that he is looking in the wrong place.* In Matthew 7:12 we learn that the Golden Rule is what is required, and always has been, in order to please God. And this rule is merely the human formulation of the moral law (expounded so heavily by Immanuel Kant) which is a product of our own reason itself, i.e., as the single rule which can be freely "seconded," if you will, by every single person alive. For while we might rather say: everyone should seek their own happiness, such a rule is incompatible with itself in a community, for if what I want is what you want, then we have a problem, e.g., the undivided affection of one and the same person.** And so (in contrast to this subjectively valid, but objectively invalid, rule of personal happiness) reason itself puts forth it's own rule as: treat all persons,including then also yourself, as a thing of intrinsic and inestimable value, i.e., (the Christian would say) as a child of God.***

[* We might even say that he is asking the wrong question. I get into this in my web site essay entitled "Essentials of Baptist Thinking."]

[** Thus the contradiction is not logical, but rather real or practical.]

[*** I am seeking the following sort of deduction of the Golden Rule (which [deduction] is Kantian, but as modified for the purpose of the Christian): God gave us reason; this reasoning capacity shows us that the only law for any rational creature is what can be a law for every rational creature; this means that we are bound necessarily only by the moral law, which, for humans, is the Golden Rule; and so (by means of this extra-biblical resource, namely the logic of Kant's Practical Reason) we see that Genesis 3:22 is correct, and that the actual expression of this is the Golden Rule (which is also apparent by this same reasoning of Kant), and so we find that the essential, practical_ components of the Bible are quite valid and are confirmed and validated by the rational capacity given to us in the first place by God, and thereby are able to side step Stanley's worry entirely and come to see the validity of the Golden Rule immediately and independently of the scriptures. I happen to think that this logic will be critically important as we (Christians) seek now to further expand the appeal of the Christian message and ethic to all the world, especially among the secular and the atheists.]

Now to carry this one step further, this moral law which grips us all and which Jesus (first among all world teachers) announces (more really than he commands) is the same as that which the devil (if the serpent is to represent that concept) and God agree, namely that we (humans) know the difference between right and wrong (compare Genesis 3:4 and 3:22).

We might also consider this: the bible is a jumble, and if it were necessary to find out what we are required to do in order to please God, then the task would become horrendous and overpowering.And it is _precisely_ this point which Mohammed proclaimed as the justification for his own "revelations" while in trance, namely: "Allah is merciful and beneficent and will not permit you to wonder and worry about what you must do. You must do this and that and the other (and he lists the five pillars of Islam), e.g., pray so many times a day, give money to the poor, go to Mecca, etc." And so Rev. Stanley evidently does not appreciate the fact that his own thesis plays directly into the hand of the Islamics (I would wish that our black UM churches were more cognizant of this point since they have to deal more directly with the onslaught of the Islamic conception in the midst of the black communities). Accept Stanley's thesis and you legitimize Mohammed's story and make the Islamics gleeful.

But if you accept Kant's thesis (which I find also embedded as a foundation, but not yet so clearly enunciated in Wesleyan thinking), then you don't have any need of Mohammed's "rectification or correction" for nothing could be more simple than complying with the Golden Rule. Or better said: nothing could be more clear than the Golden Rule (for it is still a problem of the flesh to comply with the clear demands of that Holy law/rule).*

[* It is here, perhaps, more than anywhere else that the power of the Wesleyan conception can come into play, for not only does Mohammed make clear what Allah requires, it also happens to turn out that what is required (according to his system) is doable, i.e., one does not have to become transformed to accomplish the task of acceptable living. But the Wesleyan accomplishes the same thing (practicality or do-ability) by appealing to the work of the Holy Spirit and without watering down the standard of Christian perfection. The same spirit which raised Jesus from the dead (which is a myth in Islamic thought) is present with us in enabling us to progressively approach conformity with the image and example of Christ. Hence the famous Wesleyan dictum: "while I am far from perfect, I am not as far as I was, and I am on the way;" for while the goal of Christian perfection is impossible in human terms, the power of the Resurrection gives us every reason to expect all needful assistance from God.**]

[** Yasuko tells me this is the prevalent attitude in Japan, namely: you must be a perfect person to become a Christian. Thus it would seem that Islam has an edge over us, for what that faith requires is not very difficult at all, for it has to do with external relations (very much like a simplified Judaism). But since the perfection of the Christian in Wesleyan terms has to do with the frame of mind, i.e., with the sincere intention and desire to make the Golden Rule the supreme principle of action (wherefrom then of course good actions ensue upon the perception of the opportunity for implementation of this Golden Rule), we find that this perfection is open to all of us; and then the further step of getting the flesh to conform to this supreme rule is a task of discipline (by personal will power) _and_ of the Holy Spirit (by transformation of the flesh, which is exemplified and promised in the story of the resurrection).]

This thesis of the supremacy and sufficiency of the Golden Rule, when finally grasped by the Wesleyan schools, will result in an enormous evangelistic fervor which could finally win the entire world for Christ. I expect it to happen, although it may be a while yet, for the idea, while so old, is still so revolutionary, for we simply cannot believe that Jesus meant what he said (in Matthew 7:12) in such a serious way, even though his first lieutenant and erstwhile enemy, Paul, proclaimed this doctrine in no uncertain terms (see Romans 13), and then formulated his own, marvelous expression: all things are lawful (there is no specific law any more), but not all things are expedient (not all things are functional with regard to the Golden Rule).

We can see in this light that while Paul (and Jesus) had many things to say, e.g., women should wear veils, we should not steal or murder or fornicate, etc., our imitation of him is not given in our acceptance of his _rules_,but rather in deriving our own rules _in the same way_ that he did his, i.e., by our personal, honest, intelligent derivation from the Golden Rule, given our understanding of causes and effects, e.g., medicines and poisons.

Two physicians are united in spirit (we shall say for the sake of example) in their desire to heal sick; but they are different in their understanding of the needs of the individual and/or of the efficacy of certain medicines. Once their science is completed (which, since it is empirical, will proceed only by trial and error), then their actions will also be identical. Such is the power of Paul's formulation of the gospel of Jesus, i.e., we are to seek to the very best of our ability to exemplify the love of Christ in our own hearts, and trust God for the eventual reconciliation of our differences.

I thought you might be interested in these thoughts, since they are so close to our situation at St.Mark where we are seeking to remove arbitrary and traditional barriers against free expression of the Golden Rule and to take people according to the content of their character (as Martin of Atlanta) would put it or according to the internal witness (as the Wesleyan might want to say).

PS A thought that occurred to me this weekend at Ft. Mountain (GA) State Park: this doctrine of "all things are lawful" is heady stuff and might tend to make the young and new-in-the-faith "drunk" in their freedom. For this reason it seems to me that it would be reasonable to expect parents and teachers and Paul to tone it down at the beginning in order that people (especially teenagers) avoid excesses until they grasp more clearly the "ways of the flesh", e.g., that we have enormous emotions and passions and devious intentions which can move us in ways which, while pleasurable at the moment, give us reason to regret. In this sense it seems consistent with the Golden Rule, since all things are lawful, to command the young and the new to go slowly, e.g., perhaps some men (in some circumstances) should cut their hair closely and perhaps there would be a time and situation where I also might think it wise to tell the women to wear veils. Thus it seems that the otherwise incongruent commands (regarding hair, for example) from the leading exponent of Christian freedom (Paul) would make perfect sense, and that his exhortations and his theology would comprise a thorough unity.

Again, as I alluded to above, the imitation of Paul or of Jesus should not mean that we are to take their rules for our own as far rather to take their spirit for our own and in that way then also to come up with rules and actions which best exemplify the Golden Rule in the specific situations and conditions of our existence as they did of theirs. In this way I see a perfect unity of spirit (as in the example of the two physicians above), and which will slowly develop in a unity of actions.