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Culture War Roundup for the week of April 1, 2024

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Yeah, fair. People are too eager to inflict harm on their opponents.

I don't think this admits enough. I do not believe that Gays, especially gays who are not gay/trans activists, are "opponents" of Christians; they are people who many conservative Christians view as wrongdoers (for example, I think it would be very strange to call, say, Douglas Murray, an "opponent of Christians"). More importantly, "People" at large do not profess a sacred precept of loving their enemies, so it is not egregiously hypocritical of "people" to be eager to inflict harm on wrongdoers.

I'd have to double check for each of those that stoning was what was enjoined

Here you go:

  1. homosexual sodomy: If there is a man who sleeps with a male as those who sleep with a woman, both of them have committed a detestable act; they must be put to death. They have brought their own deaths upon themselves. [Leviticus 20:13, NASB]

  2. idol worship: If there is found in your midst, in any of your towns which the Lord your God is giving you, a man or a woman who does what is evil in the sight of the Lord your God, by violating His covenant, 3 and that person has gone and served other gods and worshiped them, or the sun, the moon, or any of the heavenly lights, which I have commanded not to do, and if it is reported to you and you have heard about it, then you shall investigate thoroughly. And if it is true and the report is trustworthy that this detestable thing has been done in Israel, then you are to bring out to your gates that man or woman who has done this evil deed, that is, the man or the woman, and you shall stone them to death. [Deuteronomy 17: 2-5, NASB]

  3. sabbath breaking: “For six days work may be done, but on the seventh day you shall have a holy day, a sabbath of complete rest to the LORD; whoever does any work on it shall be put to death." [Exodus 35:2, NASB]

  4. adultery: If a man is found sleeping with a married woman, then both of them shall die, the man who slept with the woman, and the woman. [Deuteronomy 22: 22, NASB]

  5. premarital sex (in the case of women): “But if this charge [of premarital sex] is true, and they did not find the girl to have evidence of virginity [on her wedding night], then they shall bring the girl out to the doorway of her father’s house, and the men of her city shall stone her to death, because she has committed a disgraceful sin in Israel by playing the prostitute in her father’s house; so you shall eliminate the evil from among you. [Deuteronomy 22:20-21, NASB]

This isn't any substantial disagreement with you, but:

Yeah, I wasn't sure that the word opponent was right as I was writing it. Do you think "those they oppose" is more accurate?

1 doesn't technically specify by stoning, and 5 doesn't quite apply to all premarital sex, exactly, but yes, I do think it was proper to execute those laws.

Do you think "those they oppose" is more accurate?

It depends on exactly what you want to say. What I think is true about Christians and gays is that (1) they tend to be on opposite sides of the salient ideological fence more often than would be accounted for by chance, and that (2) conservative Christians often believe homosexual conduct is immoral. Whether that means anyone opposes anyone as a person or as a group depends on the particulars. In principle, people can be on opposite sides of an ideological fence where they disagree about how to achieve common objectives without being "opposed to each other". For example, my wife and I disagree about how to achieve our common objectives literally every day, sometimes spiritedly, and yet I would not say we are "opposed to each other". One can also firmly believe that another person has done wrong without opposing them personally: if believing someone has done wrong meant that you had to be opposed to them as a person, then I guess Jesus would be opposed to all of us, because he knows we have all done wrong.

As to the particulars, I think the unfortunate fact is that the culture war is a war, and people on it opposite sides are enemies. That is to say, we do not have common objectives after all, and are engaged in a zero-sum conflict with high stakes. But realize that politics can make strange bedfellows (for example, not long ago in my hometown there was a referendum to legalize the sale of liquor within the city limits, where opposition to the referendum was driven by a coalition of of bible thumping teetotalers and out-of-town liquor store owners). In this case, honest progressives -- say, the likes of Alan Dershowitz or Bret Weinstein -- often find themselves voting for the same candidates as woke zombies. So I do not think the Democrat/Republican split exactly reflects the deeper war that is going on -- which is between the fear of God on one hand, and idolatry on the other. It is the idol worshipers on both sides of the left/right political aisle (some of whom are gay activists, and some of whom, unfortunately, are professing Christians) who hate their political adversaries. The same was true in Weimar Germany.

It bears repeating that when I say "hate", I mean taking carnal pleasure in the pain and loss of another person, which I believe is always immoral (though I am not claiming that I never succumb to the temptation). When New York Times editor Sarah Jeong tweeted, "Oh man it’s kind of sick how much joy I get out of being cruel to old white men," that was explicitly hateful. (It also goes to show that you can say something about white people, and be an editor at the New York Times, while if you said the same thing about black people, you couldn't edit your own twitter account). On the other hand, when Jesus forgave his murderers on the cross, that was loving your enemies. There is a story of a US sniper in Vietnam who, after he found a target, saw through his scope that the NVA soldier was heating up his lunch. The sniper waited until the enemy soldier finished his last meal, and then shot him through the head. That also is loving your enemies.

By the way, if someone objects that shooting an enemy soldier is un-Christian because you should love your enemies, they should remember the scriptural biography of Jesus consists of five books, not four -- and He will not be walking the Earth as a mild-mannered rabbi next time.