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America, Ancient Israel, and the Old Testament
By Roger Salter
Special to Virtueonline
www.virtueonline.org
October 1, 2015
The eminent 20th century Continental biblical scholar Walther Eichrodt, in his Theology of the Old Testament Volume One, delineates three distortions or fallacious concepts of the Lord's covenant arrangement with Israel. They are plain to see in the Scripture record of the nation's religious attitudes and behavior. It is also possible to detect parallels in the life and conduct of the Christian Church throughout history, and even more particularly, perhaps, in the attitudes and actions of Christian America.
American Evangelicalism to a large extent is accustomed to thinking of itself as exceptional in that it is the bastion of Christian conviction and commitment. It is true that Evangelicalism in other places can look weary from time to time. It is true that great and remarkable strides in the cause of the kingdom have been made in America that have been a blessing to the world, and that exceptional leadership has frequently been exercised, first in the North American colonies, and then in the duly constituted United States, but is it a fair question to ask if the founding of the nation appears to be a deistical achievement rather than a gospel generated accomplishment? The Netherlands and Britain also took pride, rather conspicuously, in their supposed premier position in the purposes of divine providence (e.g. the bishop who declared that God was an Englishman - irony perhaps?), and that assumption has proven to be un-enduring and dubious in the long term and in the light of national apostasy at various times. The gauge of divine favor is discerned in the prevalence of righteousness "that exalts a nation" - rather than in productivity, prosperity, and power which often tend to pride.
The privileges of the gospel potentially expose any favored nation with severe judgment in the event of waywardness and wandering from God, and no people in any place on earth that neglects God's word and disposes of its moral compass can claim blessing as an entitlement.
Eichrodt repudiates the notion of "harnessing God to human requirements". "God Bless America" license plates should only be acquired by folk firmly resolved, by grace, to travel in a moral direction. Many in Israel's times of defection regarded God as "a benefactor deity" who failed to take spiritual condition and moral disposition into account - "since it is part of the very nature of a benefactor deity that he must distribute his gifts to the inhabitants of the land"(underlining mine). In spite of the warnings in our day in nature, and in various crisis circumstances at home and abroad, people and their representatives seem to think that it is inevitable and right that they should be favored by bigger and better blessings, even though these are not in any heartfelt way gratefully attributed to God.
The people crave a convenient God.
Eichrodt laments the descent of religion into "the one-sided development of the cultic aspect of religion". Religious observance can be a very busy and crowded business, casual and devoid of understanding and serious intent. "What are your endless sacrifices to me? says Yahweh. I am sick of holocausts of rams and the fat of calves. The blood of bulls and goats revolts me. When you come to present yourselves before me, who asked you to trample over my courts?/I> (Isaiah 1:11-12).
In Eichrodt's reckoning the people of Israel were consumed "with the outward apparatus of religion". We might add that in our time people are largely satisfied with the mere appearance of religion and it can be an ornament to their reputation in some instances -and a benefit to personal business agreements through personal contact in church attending communities. Our commentator notes: "The natural momentum of a richly developed cultic practice concentrated all the reality of religion into the sphere of outward performance, the meritorious works of sacrifices, festivals, pilgrimages, fasting and so on". But ostentatious and naive sacramentalism is not the only manifestation of futile formalism. Just "showing up" on Sunday mornings and Wednesday evenings may be a means of accruing divine benefits and approbation. This nonchalance concerning religion was the popular offshoot of Latitudinarianism within the membership of the Church of England in the 17th and 18th centuries. What concerned Eichrodt was "the externalization of man's relation to God". Form without faith is a sad phenomenon in the Church of God. Nominal attachment to religion is an advantageous feature in political campaign seasons when outright rascals pose as redeemed saints. Eichrodt warns of the "protective cover for irreligious self-seeking". In a popular sense sacramentalism can relieve the devotee of real responsibility before God and become a substitute for a genuine relationship with him.
Human nature craves a manipulable God.
Our scholar completes his trio of tragic tendencies with the observation that irreligious self-seeking is an aberration furthered in the experience of Israel, "By the failure to arrive at any satisfactory adjustment between the national power consolidated in the state and the will of God with its absolute demands (Italics Eichrodt's). Hereditary tyranny is one hazard to avoid, "egotistic-dynastic or imperialistic aims". These became features of the institution of the monarchy under some of the Old Testament rulers. The impression was fostered that Yahweh was "the natural ally of the national greatness and power" How often this attitude has been replicated in so-called Christian countries, the hubris of Holland, the pomposity of perfidious Albion, and later examples.
Human beings cherish the notion of the God of national interest.
There is a legitimate and lovely expression of patriotism. Love of country dwells in every godly heart where the influence of Christian heritage has prevailed and heightened the sense of divine goodness to a people. There are favors apparent as foci for unbounded gratitude - the gifts of creation, the rewards of endeavor, the God-enabled decency of fellow citizens through common grace, evidences of spontaneous neighborliness in times of adversity, the advances of art and culture, the progress of sound politics, the availability of comforts and conveniences, the enjoyment of liberties and rights as these are justly granted through wise legislation. Esteem for the homeland and contribution to its welfare are absolutely worthy.
But humility before God, the reverence of his Name, and obedience to his revealed will are the characteristics of great nations.
In our time throughout the western world there is decline in true religion, decadence in moral value, and a diminution of virtue. Wickedness has been especially daring over several decades and dark evils are rising to the surface and manifesting themselves in previously sacrosanct zones of life - explicit bad taste and blasphemy channeled through the media (public television and radio by no means excepted - a non-political assessment), corruption in high places, destructive influences in domestic life and consequent family strains and miseries, the narcotics culture, and the insidious penetration of social norms and mores by alarming elements of the occult (rock music, cinema, dark comedy). The fabled forties and fifties were by no means virtuous. They simply glossed over the depravity of man with a veneer of decency and innocence. Subsequent revelations from that era inform us of the colossal cover-ups that occurred.
Human nature is arrogant in its opposition to the ways of God and its declaration of autonomy. But man is not managing well if you survey the world scene and listen to the sober, candid and impartial comments of fair-minded and qualified spectators. The mood of despair and fear increases and the rate of anxiety and escapism is high. Evil in various sinister forms advances ominously. Without widespread repentance judgment is impending as the consequence of our moral deformities, and soon through the disasters of divine wrath.
