Month: June 2014

Historian Thomas Kidd: On Slavery and George Whitefield

Thomas Kidd is professor of history at Baylor University and a prolific writer. In 2012, World Magazine published Kidd’s reporting on Thomas Nelson’s decision to remove David Barton’s book The Jefferson Lies from publication.
In October 2014, Yale University Press will publish Kidd’s book on George Whitefield. In his most recent newsletter, Kidd addresses the uncomfortable fact that many otherwise admirable figures in our history owned slaves. In the case of Whitefield, he not only owned slaves but worked to advance slavery.  Kidd gave me permission to use this material from his Thursday newsletter:

The most challenging issue for a biographer of George Whitefield (as with Patrick Henry) is his identity as a slave owner. I admire Whitefield and Henry, as well as similar figures of their time such as Jonathan Edwards or George Washington, but their owning people as slaves remains an unavoidable moral problem.
How does one admire a historical figure who kept slaves? How does an author fully convey his disapproval of American slavery, while not condemning an individual altogether? I am not sure that I have gotten the balance exactly right, but we want to avoid two extremes.
One extreme might suggest that Whitefield was a great man of God, and that harping on his owning of slaves denigrates his memory as a Christian hero.
The other extreme might say that whatever Whitefield accomplished for God was fatally tainted by his owning slaves, so he is better forgotten or just used as a cautionary tale.
I think the better approach is to humbly acknowledge that we all have moral blind spots. We can justify all manner of habits and practices that, in three centuries’ retrospect, may seem appalling. But this does not excuse Whitefield’s complicity in what was a fundamentally immoral system, from the terrible wars and slave catching trade in Africa, to the horrible passage of the forced Atlantic voyage, to the dreadful working conditions for slaves, to the physical and sexual abuse that many slaves endured in the Americas.
Jonathan Edwards seems an easier case to forgive, as he only kept a few household slaves and just occasionally spoke in public about the rectitude of slave owning. Whitefield, by contrast, was arguably the key figure in having slavery introduced in the colony of Georgia, where it was originally banned. I was dismayed to find archival evidence that Whitefield may have even allowed slaves to work at the property of his Bethesda before Georgia made slave owning legal.

Although I personally lean a little more toward the “fatally tainted” extreme, I like the way Kidd articulates the situation. What I also like about Kidd’s work is that he does not hold anything back. While he confesses his personal admiration for the good the man did, Kidd presents a complete picture of his evil deeds (e.g., Whitefield working to advance slavery in Georgia). This seems to me to be the proper role of the historian.
 

Anne Arundel County Council Candidate David Whitney's Questionable Defense of State Militias

David Whitney is an instructor in Michael Peroutka’s Institute on the Constitution and is also chaplain of the MD/VA branch of the white separatist League of the South. He is also seeking the Democratic nomination to run for Anne Arundel County Council.
Whitney is a minister who believes the Bible supports no restrictions on the Second Amendment. As a part of a recent newspaper interview, Whitney says he was asked about his view of state militias. He claims a Constitutional mandate but even more basic than that, he says opponents of militias are the enemies of God. As I will demonstrate below, his appeal to the Bible is highly questionable. Whitney writes:

So the opponents of the Militia are really opponents of God’s Law. For example, you simply need to obey what Jesus said in Luke 22:36 (KJV) “Then said he unto them, But now, he that hath a purse, let him take [it], and likewise [his] scrip: and he that hath no sword, let him sell his garment, and buy one.” Therefore it would be lawless to amend away the Second Amendment. So those who oppose Constitutional Militia not only reject the Founders of our Country, they reject and violate the U.S. Constitution and the State Constitutions and more importantly they reject and violate the Law of God; the command of Jesus which is the Supreme Law of the Universe. They are the truly lawless ones in America and not those who believe Constitutional Militias must be reestablished in our land.

Ok, let’s look at Luke 22:36 in context:

35 Then Jesus asked them, “When I sent you without purse, bag or sandals, did you lack anything?”
“Nothing,” they answered.
36 He said to them, “But now if you have a purse, take it, and also a bag; and if you don’t have a sword, sell your cloak and buy one. 37 It is written: ‘And he was numbered with the transgressors’[b]; and I tell you that this must be fulfilled in me. Yes, what is written about me is reaching its fulfillment.”
38 The disciples said, “See, Lord, here are two swords.”
“That’s enough!” he replied.

Jesus and the disciples had just completed the Passover meal and Jesus was about to go out and pray. However, before He went out, He specifically referred to a prophecy that He would fulfill by being numbered among transgressors. Certainly, armed men would be considered subversives. Jesus did not stop talking at verse 36 as if he was encouraging the arming of a militia. If this was His teaching, then His militia would be pretty weak. They only had two swords and Jesus said in verse 38 that two was enough. Surely, the two swords were not enough to arm the disciples, but they would have been enough to number Jesus among the transgressors. Note that Jesus does not advise any more sales of purses, bags or sandals.
Even more evidence against Whitney’s interpretation is the fact that Jesus didn’t encourage the use of the weapons. According to John 18, Peter carried one of the two swords and when Jesus was confronted by the Roman soldiers later, Peter lopped off the ear of the high priest’s servant. The Luke 22 passage also records the scene without mentioning Peter.

47 While he was still speaking a crowd came up, and the man who was called Judas, one of the Twelve, was leading them. He approached Jesus to kiss him, 48 but Jesus asked him,“Judas, are you betraying the Son of Man with a kiss?”
49 When Jesus’ followers saw what was going to happen, they said, “Lord, should we strike with our swords?” 50 And one of them struck the servant of the high priest, cutting off his right ear.
51 But Jesus answered, “No more of this!” And he touched the man’s ear and healed him.
52 Then Jesus said to the chief priests, the officers of the temple guard, and the elders, who had come for him, “Am I leading a rebellion, that you have come with swords and clubs?53 Every day I was with you in the temple courts, and you did not lay a hand on me. But this is your hour—when darkness reigns.”

Understandably, the disciples were a little confused. They had swords but asked if they should use them. After Peter started carving up the opposition, Jesus strongly told him to stop and healed the servant. It seems pretty clear that Jesus had another thing in mind for the swords. They had served their purpose and it wasn’t to resist an unjust authority.
Whitney should worry more about bearing false witness than bearing arms. He is running as a Democrat with no intention to represent the people as a member of the Democratic party.

Mars Hill Fundraising Solicitation: Signs of Struggle or Just a Normal Emergency?

This tweet was directed my way this morning:


Many organizations issue urgent sounding end of the year appeals. It is hard to know if Mr. Lee is correct about Mars Hill or if this is just one of those formula letters sent at a strategic time to get people to give when they otherwise wouldn’t think to do so. However, if former community coach Dalton Roraback is correct and attendance is way down, then this email could be the sign of cutbacks at the Seattle megachurch.

No Date Scheduled for Publication of Mark Driscoll's Book "The Problem with Christianity", Is Resurgence On Hold?

UPDATE (6/18): Today, in response to an email inquiry, Todd Starowitz, senior public relations manager for Tyndale House, told me

At this time we do not have a pub date for The Problem with Christianity.

I also asked if any other books were slated to be published by the Resurgence imprint. I already knew Elyse Fitzpatrick’s book was scheduled for this Fall and Starowitz confirmed that her book was coming out in September. However, he also said:

To my knowledge we do not have any additional Resurgence titles that have release dates scheduled at this time.

In early 2013, Resurgence seemed poised to publish several titles with Tyndale House. Now, the flagship author does not have a publication date and no other titles are on the schedule.
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After Mark Driscoll’s book Real Marriage shot to the top of the New York Times Bestseller list for self-help books for one week in January of 2012, he secured a publication deal with Tyndale House for his Resurgence imprint. Now we know that Real Marriage was assisted in the climb to #1 status by a contract with Result Source, a firm which pursues bestseller status by gaming system of book sales counting. Driscoll’s next book from Tyndale has the working title, The Problem with Christianity, and was once slated to be published this fall. However, according to Tyndale House, the book will not be published in the fall after all.
In late May, Tyndale sent a tweet in response to my question about the book:


Tyndale House did not reply to a follow up question asking when the book would be published. The book description is still on the Tyndale website:

Are Christians Crazy? A seismic shift has occurred across the cultural landscape. In a world where Christian values once formed the moral bedrock of society, Christians are now considered nothing short of crazy. Today, questions about social issues and “intolerant” Christians hog the headlines, portraying people of faith as angry and irrelevant. This cultural shift has touched just about everything—from conversations in coffeehouses to interactions with coworkers. And more often than not, the conversation begins with someone saying, “My problem with Christianity is . . .” Whether it’s the way Christians treat gays and lesbians or the church’s stance against abortion and premarital sex, people these days just don’t have much use for Christianity. In The Problem with Christianity, Pastor Mark Driscoll presents the findings of two groundbreaking surveys about the way Christians are perceived in today’s world. And with his trademark candor, Driscoll offers timely advice about how to respond to critics.

A companion DVD is also advertised.
Amazon has the release date as January 1, 2015.
My question to Tyndale was “When do you plan to release Mark Driscoll’s new book?” The answer “not this fall as originally scheduled” told me when it wasn’t going to be released but nothing about the planned date. Perhaps the book’s publication is on hold indefinitely.
Also of interest in the aftermath of the Result Source deal is the absence of Driscoll from his agent’s list of clients. As first reported by Wenatchee the Hatchet, Yates and Yates currently does not list Driscoll as a client. I left Yates and Yates a couple of questions on their website which have gone unanswered.