Arguing with a crazy man
Mar. 23rd, 2004 02:47 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
klsiegel320I've spent some time over the past few days intermittently arguing (via LJ comments) with a crazy man - or at least, I think he's crazy. Of course, he thinks I'm crazy, so I guess that makes us about even.
It started innocently enough: he posed an explanation for the Bible's condemnation of homosexuality that I found preposterous, bordering on the frankly misogynistic, relying as it did on texts that state that the man is the head of the wife, and the wife is to submit to the husband's loving leadership. Since marriage is a model of the relationship between Christ and the church, marriage can only be something that fits that model - two partners of the same gender, being the same, cannot model the "united but different" relationship between Christ and the church.
I find it nearly impossible not to break out in hives at this interpretation. Women have been told for centuries that we're less worthy, less valuable, less spiritual than men - because "the Bible says so." Women have been told for centuries that it was perfectly okay for their husbands to abuse them - mentally, emotionally, physically - because the Bible says men are in charge. Women have been held back from social advancement, from professional advancement, from spiritual advancement - by men, because men claimed some kind of absolute Biblically-based right to dominate everything in their path.
That doesn't mean that this particular man, who happens to hold this particular set of beliefs about the Bible and its authority, is behaving in any of those ways. Of course, it doesn't mean he isn't an arrogant sod, either - I happen to think he is.
But I confess, I overreacted to the implied misogyny and went off on him about narrow-minded literalistic interpretations...so he then went off on me about that...back and forth and around and around without either of us convincing the other of anything.
And stupidly, I just tried again, going all the way back to the beginning, to his initial post. When I reread it and tried not to instinctively break out in hives at the literalism...he's not really as blatant as I accused him of being. I asked - patiently, I thought - for an explanation of why it is this way - not just "is this in there," but why. I'd lay odds he can't give me an answer, or that his answer will be something along the lines of "the Bible is the true and inspired Word of God, and everything in it is true, and that's just the way it is." It reminds me very much of when I was little, and asked why I had to do something, and the answer was essentially "because I said so."
I suppose it's entirely possible for him to really not see why it looks really arrogant from other points of view. And it's hard for me to see, but I suppose he feels that I'm just as arrogant.
Certainly I'm very sure that my approach to the Bible is rational, reasonable, and acceptable to God. Certainly he feels the same way. We both seem to feel that we're right, and anyone else who happens to disagree is wrong. And this is the fundamental difficulty facing the church right now: there's a very loud (but small) bunch of people on each of two sides, claiming to have an absolute lock on The Truth, and a very large bunch of people in the middle.
Until today, I'd've said I was one of those people in the middle. I like to think that I am. But I've been acting for the past few days like one of the people at one of the loud, small extremes.
I confidently expect another dressing-down from him, particularly as I offered a last snippy remark before I went back and reconsidered and said, you know, just screaming at each other is getting us nowhere. I'm considering excerpting part of this post as a reply - in spite of the fact that the last word in what I said before I reconsidered was basically "you win because I'm sick of this and I'm not going to play anymore."
Somehow I doubt that admitting I've been guilty of extremism and prejudice myself will have any mollifying effect. I really don't know whether a less confrontational approach might have elicited a less arrogant response in the first place; I guess we'll never know.
Sigh...I just don't know what the answer is. I truly don't. Somehow the church - not just the Episcopal church, or the Catholic church, but the whole Christian body - has to find some way to navigate. I don't think absolute strict literalism is the answer; but if it's not, then absolute, strict liberalism probably isn't either. And neither of the extremes seems able to handle the possibility of compromise. Sigh...just don't know...
It started innocently enough: he posed an explanation for the Bible's condemnation of homosexuality that I found preposterous, bordering on the frankly misogynistic, relying as it did on texts that state that the man is the head of the wife, and the wife is to submit to the husband's loving leadership. Since marriage is a model of the relationship between Christ and the church, marriage can only be something that fits that model - two partners of the same gender, being the same, cannot model the "united but different" relationship between Christ and the church.
I find it nearly impossible not to break out in hives at this interpretation. Women have been told for centuries that we're less worthy, less valuable, less spiritual than men - because "the Bible says so." Women have been told for centuries that it was perfectly okay for their husbands to abuse them - mentally, emotionally, physically - because the Bible says men are in charge. Women have been held back from social advancement, from professional advancement, from spiritual advancement - by men, because men claimed some kind of absolute Biblically-based right to dominate everything in their path.
That doesn't mean that this particular man, who happens to hold this particular set of beliefs about the Bible and its authority, is behaving in any of those ways. Of course, it doesn't mean he isn't an arrogant sod, either - I happen to think he is.
But I confess, I overreacted to the implied misogyny and went off on him about narrow-minded literalistic interpretations...so he then went off on me about that...back and forth and around and around without either of us convincing the other of anything.
And stupidly, I just tried again, going all the way back to the beginning, to his initial post. When I reread it and tried not to instinctively break out in hives at the literalism...he's not really as blatant as I accused him of being. I asked - patiently, I thought - for an explanation of why it is this way - not just "is this in there," but why. I'd lay odds he can't give me an answer, or that his answer will be something along the lines of "the Bible is the true and inspired Word of God, and everything in it is true, and that's just the way it is." It reminds me very much of when I was little, and asked why I had to do something, and the answer was essentially "because I said so."
I suppose it's entirely possible for him to really not see why it looks really arrogant from other points of view. And it's hard for me to see, but I suppose he feels that I'm just as arrogant.
Certainly I'm very sure that my approach to the Bible is rational, reasonable, and acceptable to God. Certainly he feels the same way. We both seem to feel that we're right, and anyone else who happens to disagree is wrong. And this is the fundamental difficulty facing the church right now: there's a very loud (but small) bunch of people on each of two sides, claiming to have an absolute lock on The Truth, and a very large bunch of people in the middle.
Until today, I'd've said I was one of those people in the middle. I like to think that I am. But I've been acting for the past few days like one of the people at one of the loud, small extremes.
I confidently expect another dressing-down from him, particularly as I offered a last snippy remark before I went back and reconsidered and said, you know, just screaming at each other is getting us nowhere. I'm considering excerpting part of this post as a reply - in spite of the fact that the last word in what I said before I reconsidered was basically "you win because I'm sick of this and I'm not going to play anymore."
Somehow I doubt that admitting I've been guilty of extremism and prejudice myself will have any mollifying effect. I really don't know whether a less confrontational approach might have elicited a less arrogant response in the first place; I guess we'll never know.
Sigh...I just don't know what the answer is. I truly don't. Somehow the church - not just the Episcopal church, or the Catholic church, but the whole Christian body - has to find some way to navigate. I don't think absolute strict literalism is the answer; but if it's not, then absolute, strict liberalism probably isn't either. And neither of the extremes seems able to handle the possibility of compromise. Sigh...just don't know...
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no subject
Date: 2004-04-11 04:54 pm (UTC)But, maybe the process of arguing is the answer.
no subject
Date: 2004-07-07 10:53 am (UTC)If it is any help, I just remind myself that this mess is a holy mess and Jesus loves us despite it.
no subject
Date: 2004-07-07 04:42 pm (UTC)And considering his low opinion of people who valued the letter over the spirit of the law (see the assorted arguments with the scribes and Pharisees), I doubt he'd feel the content of his own book needed much protecting.
I'm very certain Jesus loves us, but I tell you - sometimes I wonder if it's a holy mess or an unholy mess we've all gotten ourselves into...