“I will require the blood of your lives… at the hand of every man, and of his brother, will I require the life of man.
Genesis 9:5
This is a verse of the Bible that can probably be easily overlooked, but it really is quite foundational to the world you probably want to live in.
In other words, God was letting mankind know that He was going to hold individuals accountable for how they treated their fellow man. This was the beginning of a foundation for civil law.
Later, when Moses wrote what is known as the Pentateuch (the first five books of the Old Testament), he included what is known as the Mosaic Law. However, in the New Testament, Paul (the apostle) gave us a new understanding of each individual’s moral responsibility for his own actions:
“The law is not made for the just man, but for the unjust and disobedient, for the ungodly, and for sinners, for the wicked and defiled, for murderers of fathers, and murderers of mothers, for manslayers…”
1 Timothy 1:9
In the French Revolution that began in 1789, and the “Reign of Terror” that followed it, people died. The king, Louis XVI, died. His queen, Marie-Antoinette, died. In fact, 40, 000 people died before it was said and done, including the Rebellion’s architect, Maximilien Robespierre.
In that same year, 1789, the U.S. Constitution was ratified.
And (wisely) founding father John Adams wrote this about it:
“Our Constitution was made only for a moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other.”
in a speech to the military in 1798
The American government was not designed–and not really equipped–to control the behavior of people who habitually choose to do wrong things.
Years later, Abraham Lincoln (the President who issued the Emancipation Proclamation–freeing American slaves) would quote from the Bible–quoting Proverbs 25:11–when he wrote that the Constitution acted as a “picture of silver” framed around an “apple of gold” (the Declaration of Independence).
And many years after that, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. spoke these words:
“It wouldn’t take us long to discover the substance of (the American) dream. It is found in those majestic words of the Declaration of Independence, words lifted to cosmic proportions: ‘We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by God, Creator, with certain inalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness.’ This is a dream. It’s a great dream….”
from A Knock at Midnight: Inspiration from the Great Sermons of Reverend Martin, Peter Holloran, et al. | Jan 1, 2000
Dr. King went on to say, “..That dream goes on to say another thing that ultimately distinguishes our nation and our form of government from any totalitarian system in the world. It says that each of us has certain basic rights that are neither derived from or conferred by the state. In order to discover where they came from, it is necessary to move back behind the dim mist of eternity. They are God-given, gifts from His hands. Never before in the history of the world has a sociopolitical document expressed in such profound, eloquent, and unequivocal language the dignity and the worth of human personality. The American dream reminds us, and we should think about it anew on this Independence Day, that every man is an heir of the legacy of dignity and worth…”
Then he said:
“Now ever since the founding fathers of our nation dreamed this dream in all of its magnificence…America has been something of a schizophrenic personality, tragically divided against herself. On the one hand we have proudly professed the great principles of democracy, but on the other hand we have sadly practiced the very opposite of those principles.
Dr. Martin Luther King, on “The American Dream”
And on July 4, 1965, when he spoke those words in Atlanta, Dr. King was 100 percent right.
Why? Why was the “dream” of America out of reach for so many black-skinned people?
“You see, the founding fathers were really influenced by the Bible. The whole concept of the imago dei, as it is expressed in Latin, the ‘image of God,’ is the idea that all men have something within them that God injected. Not that they have substantial unity with God, but that every man has a capacity to have fellowship with God. And this gives him a uniqueness, it gives him worth, it gives him dignity. And we must never forget this as a nation: there are no gradations in the image of God. Every man from a treble white to a bass black is significant on God’s keyboard, precisely because every man is made in the image of God. One day we will learn that. We will know one day that God made us to live together as brothers and to respect the dignity and worth of every man.”
Dr. King, “The American Dream (continued)
It sounds like Dr. King’s “dream,” was filled with hope for the future.
The story of human relations through time is an interesting one.
And it starts in an unusual place.
“Be fruitful and increase in number and fill the earth.”
Genesis 9:1
Seemingly–for a while–they did just that.
In Genesis, chapters 9-10, we see a description of a culture wherein people had small family property holdings, and when children were born, grew to adulthood, married, and had children of their own, they would spread out (scatter), build their own homes, and raise their own families. Each household would have enough land to support themselves. There were no “rich” people or “poor” people. There were no “lords” or “serfs.” There were no “masters” or slaves.”
Yet in Genesis 11, we read:
“And when they removed from the east, they found a plain in the land of Sennaar, and dwelt in it. And each one said to his neighbour… ‘Come, let us make a city and a tower, the top whereof may reach to heaven: and let us make our name famous before we be scattered abroad into all lands.'”
Genesis 11:2-4
Let’s unpack that:
- God told them to fill the earth (scatter).
- They conspired to build a city (and a tower) instead.
- Their motive was to reach to heaven (to bring God down to their level?) and to make a name for themselves.
What’s your understanding of “the American Dream?” Is it all about making a name for yourself?
Or is it about something else?
What’s this imago dei thing that Dr. King was talking about?
One article interestingly claims:
“(Following the Civil War) many black leaders argued against special privileges and requested for blacks only ‘the right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness’ specified in the Declaration of Independence.”
The Mackinac Center for Public Policy
Frederick Douglass was a former slave himself, and he rejected special treatment of former slaves.
“Everybody has asked the question, … ‘What shall we do with the Negro?’ I have had but one answer from the beginning. Do nothing with us! Your doing with us has already played the mischief with us. Do nothing with us!”
Frederick Douglass, “What the Black Man Wants,” 1863
Listen carefully to an excerpt from a book about Frederick Douglass:
“It was (‘an elderly, partially literate, and intensively devout black man, whom Douglass would later refer to as Uncle Lawson‘) who imparted to the impressionable young Frederick a strong sense of self-esteem, convincing the youth that he had an important mission to fulfill.”
David B. Chesebrough, Frederick Douglass: Oratory from Slavery, 1998
Do you have a strong sense of self-esteem?
Are you convinced that you have an important mission to fulfill?
Back in Genesis 9-10, everyone had a purpose. Each family had to own a cow or a goat (milk for the children, and perhaps cheese), and chickens (for eggs and meat). Children often fed, cleaned up after them, milked them, and collected eggs from them. Each family had a small farm, and a small orchard. Each family had a garden. Often, children tended it. Mothers made clothes for their children. Fathers tanned hides. Children picked fruit. Mothers made jam, baked pies, fermented vegetables, milled wheat, baked bread, made elderberry syrup for dealing with illnesses. Fathers hunted, fished, made repairs, built homes and constructed needed tools and equipment. Parents taught children to read, write, and do arithmetic. Children submitted to parents. Families helped each other when necessary.
But a fellow named Nimrod came along:
“Now (Cush) begot N(i)mrod: he began to be mighty on the earth. And he was a stout hunter before the Lord. Hence came a proverb: Even as N(i)mrod the stout hunter before the Lord. And the beginning of his kingdom was Babylon, and Arach, and Achad, and Chalanne in the land of Sennaar.’A stout hunter’: Not of beasts but of men: whom by violence and tyranny he brought under his dominion. And such he was, not only in the opinion of men, but before the Lord, that is, in his sight who cannot be deceived.”
Genesis 10:8-10
In context of the world that had heretofore existed, Nimrod should be considered a sociopath. He tore down the culture, the society, of the world of Noah and his sons, and he restructured a new society, one which included “haves” and “have-nots,” “suzerains” and “vassals”, those who “dominate” their fellows and the unfortunate fellows that they dominate.
This new re-structured, re-imagined world is one of specialization, mechanization, and centralization. This is an urban world, filled with soot, smoke and sweat-shops.
This was not God’s plan. It was built by Nimrod–for his own benefit. This dude was strictly in in for himself.
“The mainstays of his empire were Babel (Babylon), Erech and Accad, all of them in the land of Shinar. From this country came Asshur (Assyria), and he built Nineveh, Rehoboth-Ir, Calah,and Resen between Nineveh and Calah (this being the capital).”
Genesis 10:10-12 (New Jerusalem Bible)
Be careful that someone is not using you as a pawn on the chessboard of their agenda–that someone is not using you.
A while back, Bob Dylan sang:
The Bible says:
“You know well that if you undertake to be somebody’s slave and obey him, you are the slave of him you obey…”
Romans 6:16
Don’t you think that it’s time to stop and re-evaluate some things?