Social Justice: Impossibility of Avoiding Guilt

[Chad Hutson]

I was wondering if anyone interprets this the same way I do: https://www.thegospelcoalition.org/blogs/thabiti-anyabwile/an-evangel-and-an-ethic/.

As I understand it, according to Thabiti, we are all to assume responsibility for what past generations did no matter what current conditions are. If this is his argument, it is anti-gospel. We can agree that slavery and oppression is wrong and rightfully condemn racism as historically defined (mistreatment of others due to their skin color?). But this new definition is imposing guilt by skin color, setting up an impossible standard to overcome.

I serve in an area of Appalachia that is predominantly white, but poor. It would be hard for me to convince these poor, disadvantaged people that they are guilty of oppressing anyone when they have themselves been oppressed by the "powers that be", i.e. coal and natural resource companies. We have people in our congregation who remember being raised in coal camps, living in company houses, being paid in script (rather than dollars, redeemable only in the company store), forced to work seven days a week in deplorable conditions, and so on. Thabiti and others fail to see the plight of others, in my opinion.

I could go on, but I would rather hear other's opinion on the matter.​

 

[alexandermsmith]

A few thoughts:

1) If we are to consider ethics as part of the church community, and not just as individuals, then that would implicate black members of those denominations supposedly guilty of historic racism. Yet we are not asking black members to apologise for the supposed racism of the past, only the white members. Either they're a part of the body or they're not. They can't excuse themselves when convenient.

2) He claims that the debate is between those within the church who are "awakening" to social injustice and those who are not. He gives no justification for this distinction. He gives no argument that those who are supposedly "awakening" are indeed awakening to true social injustice. He merely asserts this is the case. And he may want to say that he is separating himself from non-Christian "social justice" but that is not possible. It is one, godless movement.

3) What if we do not accept that there were past systemic injustices committed? I do not think the SBC, for example, should apologise for the sin of slavery because slavery is not a sin. It is explicitly allowed in Scripture. A slave owner is commended for his godliness in Scripture and his slave returned to him by Paul. We can discuss abuses within the system but we cannot begin to discuss justice by contradicting Biblical teaching.

4) Even if we were to accept slavery as a sin, denominations have already (foolishly) "apologised" for it. Time to move on.

 

[RamistThomist]

It is the institutionalization of anger. The Gospel Coalition has been driving off the cliff for the past few years now.

 

[Chad Hutson]

I do not think the SBC, for example, should apologise for the sin of slavery because slavery is not a sin.

Interesting. Here in the States, we cannot begin the discussion there, it would be mocked, ridiculed, shouted down.
Having preached on the subject of slavery (which we must if we preach through Scripture- it's right there!), I came to understand that slavery in the Roman world was different than what developed in North America. Slavery was oftentimes similar to employment, etc. Slaves as chattel, which developed in the plantation system, was a collaborative effort between European/Western whites and Africans, who sold their fellow man into slavery. And, at first, was introduced as indentured servitude, whites included. Many Appalachians ended up here as a result of being brought from England and Scotland as indentured servants. After a period of time (7 years), they were set free and subsequently fled to the hills, away from the "civilized" plantations. It wasn't until Anthony Johnson, a black slave owner, sued to retain ownership (successfully) of a slave by the name of John Casor that slavery became the accepted law of the land, circa 1650's. Prior to that, outright slavery was only imposed as a result of punishment, otherwise they must be let go after a period of time. Interestingly, Anthony Johnson was himself a freed indentured servant.
Bottom line: sin is ugly and will take us farther than we should ever go.

 

[alexandermsmith]

Interesting. Here in the States, we cannot begin the discussion there, it would be mocked, ridiculed, shouted down.
Having preached on the subject of slavery (which we must if we preach through Scripture- it's right there!), I came to understand that slavery in the Roman world was different than what developed in North America. Slavery was oftentimes similar to employment, etc. Slaves as chattel, which developed in the plantation system, was a collaborative effort between European/Western whites and Africans, who sold their fellow man into slavery. And, at first, was introduced as indentured servitude, whites included. Many Appalachians ended up here as a result of being brought from England and Scotland as indentured servants. After a period of time (7 years), they were set free and subsequently fled to the hills, away from the "civilized" plantations. It wasn't until Anthony Johnson, a black slave owner, sued to retain ownership (successfully) of a slave by the name of John Casor that slavery became the accepted law of the land, circa 1650's. Prior to that, outright slavery was only imposed as a result of punishment, otherwise they must be let go after a period of time. Interestingly, Anthony Johnson was himself a freed indentured servant.
Bottom line: sin is ugly and will take us farther than we should ever go.

I understand one can't start the conversation there. However it is true and should be borne in mind.

Yes slavery was different in the ancient world: it was more brutal and the slaves had less rights than in American slavery. I also think the argument itself is problematic. Paul makes no qualification along the lines of "slavery as practiced here, in this age". This is the same argumentation people use to justify sodomy today. I don't see anything in Scripture's treatment of these, and other issues, which suggests they were time and place specific. Nor can we argue (as some do) that the intention was for slavery to eventually disappear from the church. Again there is nothing in the text which suggests that. None of this is to suggest that slavery is to be commended but only to say that if we are going to talk about justice and sin we can't allow ourselves to subscribe to unBiblical notions of these.

As to the implications of the article I agree with you: its logic is that white people cannot be considered free from guilt of past "injustices". And this necessarily asks the question: what, exactly, are white Christians meant to do to "atone" for these "injustices"? There has already been corporate "repentance" for the past. Is this to happen every generation? What other steps are we meant to take?

And it is clear from what is being said by the activists that this goes much further than merely recognising, as a community, the wrongs of the past. It has been made a matter of one's salvation.

 

[arapahoepark]

Ron Burns is using that as a vehicle for his agenda.
The politics of envy. They want money. Apparently welfare from 1965, and social security from the 30s isn't enough.
And they don't want single mother, ghetto, gang culture to be blamed. Bizarre.

I commend two books to you, Life at the Bottom (about the white under class in England) and Black Rednecks and White Liberals.

 

[Chad Hutson]

"At the root of most of the problems black people face is the breakdown of the family structure. Slightly over 70% of black children are raised in female-headed households. According to statistics about fatherless homes, 90% of homeless and runaway children are from fatherless homes; 71% of pregnant teenagers lack a father figure; 63% of youth suicides are from fatherless homes; 71% of high school dropouts come from fatherless homes; and 70% of juveniles in state-operated institutions have no father. Furthermore, fatherless boys and girls are twice as likely to drop out of high school and twice as likely to end up in jail." Walter Williams. https://townhall.com/columnists/wal...tant-is-todays-racial-discrimination-n2551543
This is the problem, not only within the black community but also in poor white communities. Everything else is a distraction. The gospel can cure this.

 

[arapahoepark]

If people can't get ahead, culture is laregly to blame:
https://www.educationnext.org/actingwhite/


Will Ron Burns read these or care?

There is no theology of blessing, nor responsibility, in such a cult.

 

[Chad Hutson]

If people can't get ahead, culture is laregly to blame:
https://www.educationnext.org/actingwhite/


Will Ron Burns read these or care?

There is no theology of blessing, nor responsibility, in such a cult.

So according to this article, a primary cause of failure to educate black students is their own unwillingness to be socially ostracized. If this is true, then by embracing our current social justice platform we are actually giving them the tools for their own destruction!? To embrace perpetual victim hood is to contribute to one's own demise.

 

[Herald]

What if we do not accept that there were past systemic injustices committed? I do not think the SBC, for example, should apologise for the sin of slavery because slavery is not a sin

Slavery, as practiced in the United States, traced its genesis to man-stealing. Forcibly taking someone from their home and pressing them into slavery is indeed sin.

 

[Ed Walsh]

4) Even if we were to accept slavery as a sin, denominations have already (foolishly) "apologised" for it. Time to move on

Yes, we should move on.

Deuteronomy 24:16
The fathers shall not be put to death for the children,
neither shall the children be put to death for the fathers:
every man shall be put to death for his own sin.​

 

[alexandermsmith]

Slavery, as practiced in the United States, traced its genesis to man-stealing. Forcibly taking someone from their home and pressing them into slavery is indeed sin.

Indeed man-stealing is forbidden in Scripture. But there is a difference between the Atlantic slave trade on the one hand, and the economic system of slavery on the other. The Southern states, by and large, didn't have a say in the slave trade. They were prohibited from participating in it, a right reserved to the northern states (who were very keen on it). The Southern states weren't allowed to prevent slaves being brought to their shores or even to discourage it through tariffs. So the question then arises: what do the states do with all these people who have been basically dumped upon them? A people who are savage, cannot participate in the life of the community and if left to themselves would become a menace. Now of course there were plenty of people in the South who were quite happy for the slave trade to bring all this labour (I'm sure) but that is not the full picture. The Virginia government, for example, tried many times to discourage the slave trade and after Independence lobbied to abolish it but, again, it was the northern states who maintained it for their own profit.

Dabney goes into all this in detail. Well worth a read.

 

[Andrew35]

We see this most clearly when charges of the church’s complicity in racism are met with appeals to personal innocence. They say, “I have never owned a slave.” Or, “I am not a racist.” Implicit in those announcements of personal innocence is a distancing of the individual from the church. Whatever may be true of the church, it’s not true of me is the thinking.​

Umm... So the church has owned slaves?

And in whatever sense that may be said to be true, the church has also been slaves.

I don't get it.

 

[Herald]

Indeed man-stealing is forbidden in Scripture. But there is a difference between the Atlantic slave trade on the one hand, and the economic system of slavery on the other. The Southern states, by and large, didn't have a say in the slave trade. They were prohibited from participating in it, a right reserved to the northern states (who were very keen on it). The Southern states weren't allowed to prevent slaves being brought to their shores or even to discourage it through tariffs. So the question then arises: what do the states do with all these people who have been basically dumped upon them? A people who are savage, cannot participate in the life of the community and if left to themselves would become a menace. Now of course there were plenty of people in the South who were quite happy for the slave trade to bring all this labour (I'm sure) but that is not the full picture. The Virginia government, for example, tried many times to discourage the slave trade and after Independence lobbied to abolish it but, again, it was the northern states who maintained it for their own profit.

Dabney goes into all this in detail. Well worth a read.

I'm sorry but all your explanation does is try to turn slavery as practiced in America into a political and economic issue. Slavery created political and economic issues but the practice itself is sinful. Many people believe (and I am one of them) that the the Civil War was a judgment by God on this nation for slavery. It scares me to contemplate God's judgment on America for the national sin of infanticide.

 

[Taylor]

I'm sorry but all your explanation does is try to turn slavery as practiced in America into a political and economic issue.

I think all @alexandermsmith is saying is that slavery in and of itself is not inherently sinful. Otherwise, we would have to accuse God of sin for instituting the practice in the Law.

Slavery, if done biblically (so, not the way it was done in pre-Civil War America), could actually be a great boon for our society. It would certainly, at the very least, make our criminal justice system far more just. Instead of thieves being freely fed and housed in prison at their victim's expense (i.e., through taxes), the criminal would be forced to work off his debt to the victim (assuming he could not pay restitution, of course).

 

[lynnie]

I don't understand what appears to be the complete absence of any appreciation among the "woke" for the 300,000 white Union men who lost lives and limbs in the civil war. Do their offspring get reparations for men who gave their very lives? (You can say what the war was "truly" about (note the Corwin amendment), but Harriet Beecher Stowe's "Uncle Toms Cabin" had such a sweeping impact that many northern Christians did see it as a war for righteousness.

I've said this before- I am descended from Northern abolitionists, one of whom was a brother of John Brown of Harper's Ferry fame, who died for trying to stop slavery. So how much money do I get?

 

[greenbaggins]

Yes slavery was different in the ancient world: it was more brutal and the slaves had less rights than in American slavery.

Actually, it was the reverse. Slaves in ancient times were usually treated as almost part of the family. They were highly respected, since they were often highly skilled workers (sometimes more skilled than their masters). American slaves only had the rights that their owners were willing to give them. There were humane slave owners in the South who treated their slaves well, but there were plenty who did not. Also, in ancient times, it was usually a debt slavery, undertaken to pay off a debt, and the person usually sold himself. There were also conquered slaves in ancient times, who were sometimes treated differently. In American slavery, there was a slave trade where people were taken against their will, and breaking up their family.

 

[alexandermsmith]

Actually, it was the reverse. Slaves in ancient times were usually treated as almost part of the family. They were highly respected, since they were often highly skilled workers (sometimes more skilled than their masters). American slaves only had the rights that their owners were willing to give them. There were humane slave owners in the South who treated their slaves well, but there were plenty who did not. Also, in ancient times, it was usually a debt slavery, undertaken to pay off a debt, and the person usually sold himself. There were also conquered slaves in ancient times, who were sometimes treated differently. In American slavery, there was a slave trade where people were taken against their will, and breaking up their family.

According to Dabney there were slaves in the ancient world who had no legal rights, indeed that seems to have been the general condition; slaves in the South did, though very limited. Indeed they had the right to sue for their freedom if their owner had acquired them illegally and they were protected from abuse and the murder of a slave was murder just as the murder of a white man. Abuses within an institution does not invalidate that institution. If it did no institution would be permissable including marriage and the family.

Again we must distinguish between the slave trade and the practice of slavery. All slaves come from somewhere. Was there no man-stealing in the ancient world? Paul does not distinguish. He does not say: "Servants, be obedient to them that are your masters according to the flesh (unless you were stolen in which case cast off your yoke and rebel)." He says "Servants, be obedient to them that are your masters according to the flesh."

 

[arapahoepark]

According to Dabney there were slaves in the ancient world who had no legal rights, indeed that seems to have been the general condition; slaves in the South did, though very limited. Indeed they had the right to sue for their freedom if their owner had acquired them illegally and they were protected from abuse and the murder of a slave was murder just as the murder of a white man. Abuses within an institution does not invalidate that institution. If it did no institution would be permissable including marriage and the family.

Again we must distinguish between the slave trade and the practice of slavery. All slaves come from somewhere. Was there no man-stealing in the ancient world? Paul does not distinguish. He does not say: "Servants, be obedient to them that are your masters according to the flesh (unless you were stolen in which case cast off your yoke and rebel)." He says "Servants, be obedient to them that are your masters according to the flesh."

At the risk of starting another war on here, Respectfully, I wouldn't use Dabney as an unbiased historian of the Civil War and slavery.
https://americanvision.org/15670/robert-l-dabney-on-chattel-slavery-and-equal-protection-of-the-law/

 

[Chad Hutson]

The system of slavery that developed over time in North America was distinctly different than that of the ancient world. That is a given. The only comparison would be with the slaves won by war who were treated as chattel, abused, overworked, etc. Otherwise, slavery was like employment- often the slaves were autonomous, educated, skilled as doctors and artisans.
The issue that I am concerned with is not whether we think slavery as practiced in America was/is wrong, but rather how can anyone hope to reconcile race relations if we set an impossible standard for reconciliation. I see it as anti-gospel in that one side is clamoring for repentance and restitution while denying the possibility of grace or forgiveness. They are also holding a current generation hostage for the actions of past generations. In the new way of reckoning, no matter how good I am personally toward those of a different ethnicity, I am still guilty because I am white. It's madness!
If I as a pastor were to follow the guidance of the grievance community, I would have to explain to my 90% white congregation that they are guilty of racism no matter how well they treat their fellow man, by virtue of the deeds and attitudes of people they never knew or never met.

 

[alexandermsmith]

At the risk of starting another war on here, Respectfully, I wouldn't use Dabney as an unbiased historian of the Civil War and slavery.
https://americanvision.org/15670/robert-l-dabney-on-chattel-slavery-and-equal-protection-of-the-law/

I didn't say Dabney was unbiased (we all have our biases) but that doesn't make him a liar. Dabney's book specifically deals with Virginia and thus the South by extension. I could quite believe there were differences between the states (there were certainly Southern states who were in favour of maintaining slavery after Idependence and whichjoined with the north to achieve that end) but I haven't been presented here with any historical evidence which contradicts Dabney's quite thorough survey of the reality of slavery at the time.