What I learned about politics and good governance from reading 1 Samuel

As we are in full political swing right now - I thought I would share a post I wrote about what the bible can teach us about - politics. 

I have been - off and on - reading the Bible and posting my thoughts about it - at my Humanist Bible Study blog - http://humanistbible.blogspot.com/  I stopped after my father died - but am planning to get back into it when time allows.  I do have enough to publish a Humanist Bible Study of the Pentateuch though. 

This post is from 2014. And it's about - the book 1 Samuel. 

As I keep reading, I get more and more and more into the stories.  This one is one of my favorites so far. Partially because it's political.  I'm a Humanist - so the moral politics and what the moral lessons for politics intrigue me. Especially since the lessons weren't what I thought they would be given what political Christianity looks like and advocates for in the United States.

Anyway - here are the political lessons I took away from 1 Samuel:

• Fair and impartial judges are essential to peace among people. (1 Samuel 7)
• Monarchy’s are against the will of God. (1 Samuel 8)
• Don’t suppress dissent with violence (1 Samuel 11:13)
• If you want peace, don’t appoint a man of war to rule over you. (1 Samuel 14) 
• You get the government you deserve (1 Samuel 12:12)
• God does not support preemptive attacks. (1 Samuel 13) 
• Sometimes you win by not fighting. (1 Samuel 26)
• Violence begets violence (1 Samuel 30)
• Plotting to overthrow a government? Even if you have god on your side, you still need to be a bit sneaky. (1 Samuel 16)

The entire story is one of corruption vs. honesty in governance.  The people want a king. God warns them that kings are bad. They demand a king. God chooses one for them, this is Saul. Turns out - Saul doesn't obey God in quite the right anal retentive way God wants him to and so God starts to plot against Saul by choosing and mentoring David through lots of political maneuvering and fighting. Saul becomes increasingly corrupt in his quest to maintain power and it is this corruption that serves as the moral heart of the story.

What surprised me was that god is pro-judges and basically anti organized government. Not sure how you have judges without a way to pay them, but I guess since at the time the priestly class were the judges, they got paid as part of their priestly duties to the people. That's why they got to keep a portion of all the sacrifices.

Regardless, the preference is clearly for a type of theocratic based self rule.  I'd call it libertarian, except that it's clearly theocratic. Rule by priests/judges - when you need them.  But, there were lots of priests and judges and people were free to follow whichever one they thought most "godly" with individuals really only standing out as good from time to time.

This book also makes the case against nepotism and biological succession. Because whenever someone was godly/goodly - his sons were inevitably not.

The final thing that really shocked me about this story is the homosexual love story between Saul's son Jonathon and David - the king in training. Whatever political Christians try to say about what god thinks about gays - is wrong. They just haven't read this book. 

The power of metaphor

So, yesterday I got an email from someone who doesn’t understand what a metaphor is. And upon hearing the words “it’s as if” did not realize that what came afterwards was not meant literally. The actual construction was “it’s as if you told me you believe in invisible flying pigs.” It’s in a video I made on youtube. Anyway, this person sent me an angry email telling me that they don’t believe in invisible flying pigs as that would be ridiculous. (sigh)

Ok. So what is a metaphor and why are they important? Ignore the fact my example is actually that of an analogy. A metaphor is a way of comparing two different things as a way of showing how they are the same. My construction was that someone telling me they believe in god is the same as if they told me they believe in invisible flying pigs. Both are ridiculous to me – not to be offensive to anyone of faith – it is just if faith made sense to me I wouldn’t be an atheist. Would I?

Anyway the reason metaphor is important is because if you take everything literally, then when Jesus says he is the bread and water of heaven – you would think the man was literally made out of bread and water. Which of course would be ridiculous even though the 2nd half is of course, true, we humans do have a lot of water in us. This passage is best understood as metaphor – as in, he is as central to heaven as food and water is to life itself. In other words, without Jesus, no heaven. See how much more interesting things are when you understand metaphor?

Do Not Do Evil

Humanists can find moral learning everywhere. And yes, that does include the Bible. My attention was drawn to 2 Corinthians 13 today. Don’t ask why. Keep in mind that I am an atheist in addition to being a Humanist, so when I read things about prayer and god etc I tend to translate them or skip past those bits and look for the gist behind it all. I also haven’t actually read all of Corinthians so I don’t know the context of this section. But just having read the short section of 2 Corinthians 13 there are some really nice bits. Specifically verse 7: “But we pray to God that you may not do evil, not that we may appear to have passed the test but that you may do what is right, even though we may seem to have failed.” The point is to not do evil. Not so that we look good, but because not doing evil is the right thing to do. As a Humanist I can agree with that even though I don’t agree with most Christians about the nature of evil. I think Kurt Vonnegut once said that being a Humanist means doing good without expectation of reward or punishment after you die. Same basic sentiment when you think about it.

Verse 11 is also good. “Finally, brothers, rejoice. Mend your ways, encourage one another, agree with one another, live in peace, and the God of love and peace will be with you.” I like this not because it enjoins us to come together to pray – but it calls on us to come together to live in peace and to encourage one other to be good people. Again, this is something as a Humanist I totally agree with. That is my vision of how I would prefer the world work. And it is one of the reasons why I write this column and my podcast. I think we all need ongoing encouragement to lead ethical lives of personal fulfillment in service to the greater good of humanity.

Humanist moral lesson of the day: Do not do evil.

A Quick Tip

If you think the bible is too liberal and needs to be re-written to reflect a more conservative viewpoint, then you might want to consider this chilling possibility. You may be a Christian in name only and the religion you think you are practicing is probably not Christianity. My quick tip of the week is to actually read the bible for yourself instead of waiting for the conservative re-write. After all, if the good book has worked well for the past 1,500 years, then perhaps it is fine the way it already is.