Alexis Jacobi wrote: ↑Tue Jan 25, 2022 8:22 pm
Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Tue Jan 25, 2022 6:42 pmI gave you two very good reasons for realizing that Liberation Theology is not only not something we must talk about...but why it's also totally irrelevant to do so. I will list them again:
1. It's anachronistic -- LT is a recent phenomenon and Modern...about 2,000 years later than the Bible.
2. It's Catholic -- and as I've said before, Catholic is its own thing, distinct from Christian. (I am aware you don't see it that way, but you can hardly expect me to speak for a view you hold and I don't, can you?)
The question
Why Is Slavery Wrong is not confined to the Bible, is it? Those who participate on this forum are modern persons, and all of them, all of us, have been informed, in one degree or other, by the political and social struggles of the last 60-80 years.
Back to the main question, then.
Prove to me, with reference to "modern persons" and "modern information...from the political struggles of the last 60-80 years" (as you stipulate) that slavery is
wrong.
I'm listening.
If the question is Why Is Slavery Wrong -- there is obviously a connection to the issue of Colonialism.
Do you mean the "colonialism" of whites, or of Arabs, who have been fare more involved in slavery, especially the Trans-Saharan trade? What about the black enslavers and slave traders on the African continent? Or how about the colonialism of the South American and Caribbean slave trades?
Critical Race Theory has numerous points of connection to BLT.
Both are thoroughly poisonous ideologies, actually. Both are deeply racist and Neo-Marxist, and both are driven by what Nietzsche called
"ressentiment."
But I'm not clear on how either one of them is capable of answering the question: in fact, I know they can't.
Black Liberation Theology is a direct product of Protestant Christian culture and history.
Well, we're going to get into some more technical stuff and deep waters here. BLT is not a product of all, or even of most Protestant theology. It's a product of things like Neo-Marxism, racist resentment and the weak and debased humanist theology of "social justice" congregations.
There is a direct line that runs from the spiritual view and position of, say, African American religious that goes directly back to 'Biblical times'.
Not quite right.
It is certainly true that slaves in, say, America, co-opted Biblical narrative to their own purposes. And why not: after all, these were largely uneducated people, living under considerable tyranny; why should they not find themselves sympathetic with the plight of ancient Jews in Egypt?
But they were not in Egypt. And they were not Jews. And there circumstances were not the circumstances of the ancient Israelites. So their enthusiasm was merely by way of feeling and analogy, not at all by way of the literal or the text. We can understand and sympathize with their affinity with the Biblical story: but, to state the obvious, Exodus was not written to or about them, no matter how passionately they may have wished it had been.
It is at least in some sense a Christian conscience that is doing this.
Objecting to slavery? Yes.
William Wilberforce, an evangelical Christian, was responsible for the elimination of slavery in the British Empire. He gave his life to that cause. And he did so because of his Christian conscience.
Likewise, the anti-slavery movement in America was powerfully backed by Christians of conscience. And Republican soldiers marched into battle to Protestant hymns. The fact that, as Genesis says, and as Acts reaffirms, all men are made "of one" and "in the image of God" made it inevitable that Christians of good conscience would end up against slavery. Not all the powerful cultural rhetoric of the South and its Democrats could prevent that.
And MLK was, officially, a Protestant pastor, you will know. His co-optation of Biblical language was frequent, emotive and rhetorically powerful. And it, too moved the consciences of Americans raised in a Protestant ethos.
So yes, Protestants had a heck of a lot to do with the ending of slavery.
But what are we to make of that next?
None of that is the divine concern. It's merely an artifact of human hubris...nothing more important than that.
Respectfully, I think what you state here is chemically-pure opinion. How could you possibly know, and how could you possibly set limits on, what is of divine concern?
Biblically.
But as I always say *I respect your ideas and your opinions*.
Likewise. I don't have to partake of all the same opinions you hold in order to find I respect you and appreciate your conversation. Agreeing with me is never a prerequisite for respect.
So please, continue as you think appropriate. Remain assured that you are in no way out of good standing with me. I quite enjoy our exchanges. You're quite circumspect, fair, and not prone to
ad homimems or other irrelevancies, and even if I don't always agree, I don't find your thinking the least bit superficial.