Huff Expressions

Mark Twain was either Mark Twain, or someone else using that name. He may have also been Samuel Clemmons. Nonetheless, among the plethora of type which flowed from his mind is this reminder: "Want to learn how to write? I’ll give you three words of advice: Write, write, and write."

Learning to write. If one were to write 1,000 words a day every day there is a chance they would be a good writer. Comes to mind: What of those who talk 10,000 words per day. Are they good talkers? Well…. The point is that writing well and writing somewhing worth reading can easily be opposite realities.

On this general note I have been thinking lately about word-addiction. I have a tendency to pick up and read whatever is around wherever I am. Thankfully, my dad had a rule against reading at the table at meal time. I try to maintain that rule today, unless I am eating alone. But reading just to read, to be lost in whatever journey the writer would take me on, the kind of thing anyone taking the time to read these words may be doing: what is that?

Seems not far removed from TV watching or other mind-numbed activities. How do we read more purposively — not reading just to read?

There are no doubt many good suggestions, and I hope they would not rule out reading my occasional postings; but I am thinking something outside that box. What about refusing to read just to read — indeed to not read so much. Instead, one could take a walk, sit quietly and think, create music (as oppose to listening to it), take a nap, converse with another human person, etc. All these are the kind of things I should be doing right now instead of typing more words and looking at a screen.

It is Spring and the sun is getting lower in the sky. My friend Seldon is having surgery tomorrow. I will go see him for a minute. I will watch my boys play and I will laugh with them. And I will look forward to the beauty that Jane brings with her very presence when she returns a little later. All of these are described in words, and I enjoy doing so; but I want to live them more than read about them. For life is more than words and understanding. It is living within them, and I am going to go give it a try.

I love the musical “Fiddler on the Roof”. Full of tradition, pageantry, life, truth, humor, pathos and pain. In a word, reality; reality from a Jewish, which is to say ancient, perspective.

You have to love the little guy, the town spokesman who brings a rowdy discussion to order with the nasal command, “Quiet down! Quiet down!” And when he says something clever he congratulates himself: “Well put! Well put!” However, it is from his mouth that the lex rex commentary came, and I am thinking that now I know why he was not the town rabbi. At least I am going to make a case why I think he was wrong.

When the village men were discussing their response to violence, someone shouted: “An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth”, referencing the ancient code from the OT, the lex rex. To this our village crier responded: “Right. Then the whole world would be blind and toothless.”

Huh? This kind of conclusion sounds clever, but it is simply wrong. Lex rex is about justice, a law outside of you and I that looks down and says, “OK, you stole $100, now repay $100.” It does not follow that there is infinite progress, that since my repaying is a payment, I must now be repaid and so on, ad infinitum.

If I injure my friends, I should be likewise injured in order to make the thing right. If I murder someone, I should be killed. It is about justice, about restoring an even scale. The point is that the progress is stopped because the law is outside of us.

For example, when the arm of justice – the state – kills a murderer, the state is not therefore guilty of murder. The state is merely guilty of doing its job – of carrying out justice. Our friend in ‘Fiddler’ would have the state hauled in and ‘killed’ and then the state-’killer’ killed etc., until no one is left. Nonsense.

Of course he wasn’t thinking of the state – he was thinking of individuals. Hatfield shoots McCoy’s cow so McCoy shoots Hatfield’s cow or worse and it escalates from there. Eventually, all cows are gone. But you can’t go there unless you deny the necessity of government. The answer is found in justice from outside of us.

If I take a tooth and repay with one, the scales are even, end of story. It is absurd to say then that the whole world will be toothless. The only way that would happen if is half of the world became brutal dentists and the other half returned the favor. That ain’t gonna happen. Ron, Dale, Kevin, Rick – someone: bail me out here. I think I’m right.  But I know someone else sees it more clearly.

Bottom line: “Jesus said”. That is the final word, the word of Truth, the word of Justice. He said in Matthew 5:

You have heard that it was said, ‘An eye must be put out for an eye. A tooth must be knocked ut for a tooth.’ (Exodus 21:24; Leviticus 24:20; Deuteronomy 19:21) but here is what I tell you. Do not fight against an evil person. uppose someone hits you on your right cheek. Turn your other cheek to him also. uppose someone takes you to court to get your shirt. Let him have your coat also. uppose someone forces you to go one mile. Go two miles with him. ive to the one who asks you for something. Don’t turn away from the one who wants to borrow something from you.”

May the Lord deliver me from ignorance. Does this passage deny justice? Never. But it is the better answer to our ‘Fiddler’ friend. On a personal level, Hatfield and McCoy will always be at it. The best earthly justice is not omnipresent. And, worst of all, the best justice is still implemented by humans, and is thus deeply flawed.

The only answer is Jesus – he gave us the truth. He IS omnipresent, so He says to His followers, do not return evil for evil. Be the one who breaks the cycle, allow Me to be Justice, don’t take it upon yourself: turn the other cheek.

Let Christ be true and every man a liar. I do not know the full meaning of the words. Do they rule out earthly judges? Of course not. Instead, it would seem, Jesus is saying, “Do not take lex rex into your own hands. Vengeance is mine: I will repay.”

Of course God ordains earthly governments, charged with the task of meting out justice. But in the end, God is the judge. He will make all things right; He will make all things new. Left to ourselves we would indeed be blind and toothless. But, thanks be to God, we need not be bound in some cycle of prolonging the wounding. God came in, Jesus spoke, and everything is different.