I wrote this a couple of weeks ago when I was stressed out. I'm stressed out again today, so I reviewed it and I'm posting it here. But first, here's the music I'm into right now:

...and, um, also this:

I realized after re-reading my most recent post that I left a few loose ends hanging, which I would like to mend...maybe not in elaborate depth in this post... First, I left open potential for concerns about legal uniformity in a Theonomic nation. Second, I think I should dig a bit deeper into whether there is a substantial distinction between "canonical" (though not inspired) commentary and the necessity of Christian fellowship in enabling proper Biblical interpretation.

I think I've discussed the issue of legal uniformity in another post somewhere.... but I don't remember. I know I wrote a paper on the topic and submitted it to an informal publication, but it hasn't been published. Here are the basics:

Biblical law is a true bottom-up hierarchy. There is no court of appeals, and people elect every tier of judge, with the lowest tier governing only ten people. Higher judges may not overturn the rulings of lower judges, and people may not appeal their decisions to higher judges. The higher judges only exist to resolve disputes which are too hard for lower judges, such as those issues which bridge the jurisdictions of several lower judges; the lowest common judge may be invoked. All judges are elected by and from among the people. They elect judges who they know personally and respect, and consider to have certain qualities enumerated in scripture. Furthermore, "the people" (that group of 10 people) are the accusers, defendants, jury, and executioners among themselves. They elect their judge, and they can choose not to penalize if the judge has been unjust.

What all this means is that there's a lot of room for variation in legal interpretation among different judges, because the judges cannot really step on one another's toes. two neighboring jurisdictions can have very different interpretations of many laws, and still function as neighbors, because their jurisdictions are clearly defined. And, if a case bridges the jurisdictions on the matter of that disagreement, then the lower judges must accept the ruling of the higher judge to whom they defer (if they don't resolve it among themselves).

The Christian state is designed for unity in diversity. Many jurisdictions with different interpretations of the law -- the best interpretations evidencing themselves as such by the greater equity with their constituents experience.

Now, on the matter of the distinction between commentary and community. That is, I am choosing to avoid producing a commentary on scripture, to which people might turn if they aren't sure about a passage, on the grounds that I do not believe that a right interpretation of Biblical Law should be considered only-possible with help from such a commentary. However, I do believe that a right interpretation of scripture is only possible when Christians are meditating on scripture together, engaging with their community, and discussing their disagreements with one another.

So, why community, but not commentary? What's the difference between a spoken commentary and a written one? 

Actually, I very much value the commentaries I've read -- the preserved works of Augustine, Calvin, and Tertullian are some of my good friends, and I think everyone should read them. I shy away from legal commentary in particular, because of what I see in other attempts at Christian nations. They reference the legal commentary instead of the scriptures when deciding a case, and as their understanding of practical applications evolve, so do the commentaries. Consider the endless rabbinic traditions -- so massive and absurd that Jews don't even have the confidence to approach the word that God gave them and commanded them to read aloud to one another. To be sure, nobody should be referencing Calvin instead of scripture either (and it is with much grief that I often observe people issuing references to confessions as arguments against references to scripture).

What I'm opposed to are not simply expository tomes, such as Bavinck's Dogmatics or any one of the many Systematic Theologies out there, but rather works designed to function as reference manuals, which is exactly what I hoped the wiki would be -- a thing where people could get Biblical topics explained to them so well that they didn't have to search the scriptures for themselves. I think that this goal, if achieved, would destroy just governance, as all righteous judges must be constantly meditating on scripture -- I believe that the maintenance of a good judge depends on consumption of  fresh meat carved right out of the book itself, not pre-digested food written out by some careful scholar. 

A good judge shouldn't ask, "tell me what the Bible says about theft" when a court case arises. He should already know it, because between cases he was reading the Biblical laws in total and asking, "why does the Bible say this?". And those questions should not be so few that it is practical, nor so depreciated that it is tolerable, to have pre-packaged answers which everyone in the state gets from the same extrabiblical source. The questions should be met with constantly reforming answers which everyone in the state seeks after and fights with one another to refine and perfect by means of Biblically prescribed community discussions and confrontations, so that no jurisdiction can assert undue authority over another by changing the law book which the other references for its cases.

For very controversial matters, debate books and theological works will be written down, and the proper answer will be summarized and remembered in history, just as it has been with every major theological debate since Christ -- the Church passes on this knowledge with excellent efficiency. Consider how many people have never read Haggai, which contains much comprehensible information, but yet have an ardent commitment to the Trinity, which is a far more complex and incomprehensible (though indispensable) doctrine. We don't need to pre-empt these debates by producing a reference manual to cover every possible past and future unstated application of the whole law.

So I encountered this today:

And all of a sudden, I can't get enough Bulgarian choral music.

Things have been kinda crazy lately. I'm not sure what it is, but my house feels like it's on edge. Thankfully, activity has died down on most of my social media things, and I don't have any video games that I'm terribly interested in. I'm becoming more able to focus on my work at the office lately, and although I still find myself reluctant to start any given task, and frustratingly resilient to new information, I think I'm progressing here at a barely tolerable pace. My prior direct report talked well about me, and so the people here have expressed very high expectations for me, and I'm crushing myself with hopes that I won't disappoint them.

I haven't been interested in reading the theological tomes on my shelf at all recently... I still enjoy a good Bible study, but rather than reading my old textbooks, I have been taking comfort in written fictions, as they're (I suppose) a form of escape from reality which doesn't seem to get me into trouble. Right now I'm reading "Remote Control", by Nnedi Okorafor, and I find it to be immensely engaging. Attraction to the ethos of classical western science fiction is a vice of mine, though, and so I intend to pick up some Asimov, Wells, Orwell, Vonnegut, or Lewis next... and I hope that struggling through their Shakespearian excellence doesn't crush my spirit entirely. I've thought of picking up Animal Farm next, because I haven't finished it yet -- last time I started that book, it stressed me out so much that I started hallucinating and couldn't sleep well, so I stopped reading it. I was pretty young at the time, and I can't imagine that the political themes in it will be worse or more stressful to me now than the godlessnesses all around us, which constantly threaten me with the necessity of deciding whether I should lose myself in opposition to them or lose my soul by feigning ignorance of them -- and how may I regard myself when I so willingly own that I procrastinate in such an important decision, when every moment of procrastination places me in complicity with them. What can I do except wait and hope to encounter in place that community of theonomic brethren, and expend all my tears to teach my son about God's good law, in hopeless hopes that the church will soon realize it with him and establish right freedom and justice in our land.

...in any case, I hope that I can use these fictions to re-establish in myself a firm habit of reading each night. Having that in place, I intend to transition myself back to more difficult literature, like my old friends, Augustine and Calvin.

Moreover, I'm less convinced that I will return to my theonomic wiki project. I started that project in hopes of making a reference whereby people could easily withdraw all verses relevant to a topic, with commentary, so that an uninitiated person could inquire easily as to the Biblical response to a certain crime. However, having seen the breadth of disagreements concerning Biblical interpretation, and their implications, and having learned more the incredible efficiency of God's written law, I am less convinced that the commentary I originally intended to provide is valuable, and more convinced that it should deliver nothing more than a list of relevant verse references per category.

You see, occasionally I am confronted with persons who espouse communism and respond to examples of failing communist countries by informing me that it's never been properly implemented. I think that the response is silly. Also, occasionally, I confront non-theonomists, and when they give me examples of failing religiously motivated governments, I respond by informing them that theonomy has never been properly tried. 

In order for me to distinguish myself from the former, I must be able to give a clear practical illustration of the difference between theonomy and all other religious nations, and in a way which accounts also for the failures of puritanism. And, whenever I undertake to research those countries and find fault with them, the obvious conclusion which presents itself to me is this: they made additional laws. They didn't just take the Bible as-is and say "this is our law book". In the case of the puritans, it appears to me (and I know that many will contest this) that their additions were originally motivated by specification; some Biblical issues are unclear or controversial, and so legal uniformity in a society requires some kind of tangible agreement on certain interpretive issues -- just how tall should my parapet be, anyway? Well, now we've added to scripture, a law not just requiring parapets, but requiring parapets of certain height, and thereby we've made the rule relevant to a specific use-case, and potentially removed its relevance from other use cases, which will later demand further specification, "this high under these circumstances; that high under other circumstances". Iterate that a few hundred thousand times, and you might find yourself sitting in congress. Or, if your additions suck, then maybe your nation will simply fail.

But the Bible does not directly address issues which we know that Biblical law does cover; Biblical law is delivered primarily in the form of case law, and so these cases are intended to be applied to a broad range of moral issues with some measure of abstraction. Furthermore, there are occasionally situations where the Bible does not say that a thing is illegal, but we know that it *must be* illegal because of the context of the passage; the spirit of the law. For example: notice that Deuteronomy 22:22-30 does not say anything directly about raping a married woman, or else on a strictly literal reading of verse 22, one might say that the victim in such a case should be killed as well, but we know from verse 25-26 that a betrothed victim is spared. So then, the first three cases (22, 23-24, and 25-27) are read as "thus, and also thus" (as opposed to "thus, but in another case thus"), but most translations of verse 28 use phrasing which strongly suggests, or directly states, that the unmarried woman in that case was raped and the man does not get killed. Well, it seems that the Hebrew does not directly say rape, but uses words which could imply it in the same way that "seizes her and lies with her" should imply it in English. So, while the unstated items here seem to imply that the married woman is killed with her rapist, and the unmarried woman is forced to marry her rapist, the notion that only a betrothed woman receives the highest protection under the law is entirely nonsensical, and so to justify the most popular reading of the fourth case (verses 28-29), an interpreter should also be able to explain contextually why that case is linked to the others by "thus, but in another case thus" instead of "thus, and also thus", whereas all prior cases were "thus, and also thus", and the four cases are very plainly given in a connected sequence (from married, to betrothed, to not betrothed). 

It's this kind of thing which brings about a certain dilemma: the Bible demands specification by not giving absolutely plain instruction all the time. However, the Bible defies specification by explicitly commanding against addition.

The more I think about it, I find myself being dragged quite unwillingly to the conclusion that there should be no specification or canonical commentary at all in the theonomic nation, and that the law can only be properly interpreted by persons who are guided by the Holy Spirit, and who devote themselves whole-heartedly to conforming their minds to the mind of Christ -- that is, to cultivating in themselves (by the guidance of the Holy Spirit, and by frequent interaction with Him toward developing a relationship) a firm understanding of the "Spirit of the Law". And so legal interpretation becomes a deeply relational endeavor. I hesitate to say that it exists "between you and God", because our relationship with God is cultivated in large part by relationship with other believers; iron sharpening iron. The judge in a theonomic state can only rightly persist as such if the community there is committed to encouraging, loving, edifying, sometimes confronting, and building one another up in the knowledge of God.

All that to say, it seems to me that the judges in a theonomic nation should just hang out with one another really often and meditate on scripture all day, and that's how the theonomic nation should be run. Proper judgement shouldn't depend on whether a judge has read some specific commentary, or else we've made scripture insufficient for instruction in righteousness. And the ability of citizens to understand the law shouldn't depend on some terribly difficult hermeneutic (for example, by saying that all the laws concerning metaphorical "seed" are abrogated -- how terribly convoluted, to rest a criminal sanction on decisions about whether something fits in with that metaphor!), but should be intuitive, and grounded in a right relationship with God. I can sit and dissect Deut 22 all day, but really, it's not hard to reach the same conclusions just by sitting and reading the passage, and intuiting, "this plainly doesn't mean that the married victim of rape should be executed along with the aggressor."

So, with that in mind, I might still revisit the theonomy wiki idea later, but with a very different approach in mind. I think I'm just going to do verse references and topic names only. It'll be "show me verses pertaining to the office of judge", and then it pulls up a list of relevant passages. This kind of thing has been done many times before, and I am sure that the product will be less popular, but I think I can do it a little better than the others before me, and I have some ideas in mind for how.

"Dive, thoughts, down to my soul"

Lots to write about today. 

So first of all, I've moved to Connecticut, and I'm set up in my new place. It's beautiful. The apartment complex is very quiet; there are some woods with paths going out into them, and a nice pond, right behind our unit. We're not too far from all the stores we need, and my commute isn't too too bad (although my wife prefers me to be home as soon and as much as possible to help with Isaac.) Chowon is adjusting really well to the rural lifestyle; it's really not that different from living in Phoenix, except that all our drive times are a little longer. 

Oh my goodness, I just remembered I have a list of things I need to accomplish!

Bleh; Memorial Day Weekend was too good. I almost forgot all my worries.

Here are some things that keep happening to me in debates, which drive me nuts:

- Appeals to authority

- Appeals to common opinion

- Utilizing emotionally charged examples to gain the high ground

- Saying that since a word means X in one place in the Bible, it must mean X in every place.

- Saying that a word means X in one place of the Bible, even though it never is used to mean that in any other place.

Anyway, I've been plugging away at some theoretical stuff for a while now, and I want to get it down in my blog. I'll start by summarizing several ideas which I've covered before, and the end of this will be to tie it together into explanations which I think are satisfactory. Topics to be addressed include: Euthyphro, God as the author of evil, the problem of evil, predestination and moral responsibility, and my most recent trouble: the nature and relevance of duty.

Alright, so to start off (I think I've covered this a number of times before): Euthyphro. What makes a thing good or evil? Is it good because God said to do it, or did God say to do it because it's good? If it's good because God said it, then it's arbitrary; God can say conflicting things and there will be true contradictions about goodness (ftr, true contradictions are not allowable). If God said it because it's good, then goodness is a standard outside of God, and God is not ultimate in morality.

The answer to this one is easy: It's good because it aligns with God's character. God says it because it aligns with God's character. God's character is unchanging, so the standard won't change. God's character is not arbitrary, but rather all things are dependent upon His character, (which also defines his creative will), and so morality is not arbitrary.

That comes up terribly often for a problem with such a simple answer. Some rebuttals have included things like, "doesn't that make 'God is good' a tautology?" which is also a really easy one to rebut. "God is good" isn't a tautology because "good" in that statement lacks a definition and is presently subject to query, whereas "God" is known by his many deeds and words recorded in scripture. Furthermore, "good" describes a characteristic of God; whereas "goodness simpliciter" does not have the capacity to act, it can be a "good thing" for one described by "goodness" to act. So, "God is good" does not teach us about God, but it rather teaches us about "good". Goodness is conformity to God's character.

That leads us into the issue of God authoring evil. God predestined everything; didn't he decide that evil deeds would happen? If so, isn't God evil?  To answer this, remember: goodness is conformity to God's character. Inversely, evil actions are actions which are not consistent with God's character. That is, ask the question: "if God were in my circumstance and station, with my abilities and limitations, and my authorities and relations, would he do X?". If the answer is "no", then it's evil. If the answer is "yes", then it's good. (this is a bit of a simplification, but I think it is sufficient to build upon). 

Now, we know God's character because of his actions. It is not outside of God's character to create something capable of deviating from God's character. It is not evil to do so. It is not outside of God's character to plan on someone deviating from God's character. It is not evil to do so. 

So, did God author deeds which deviate from his character? Yes. Does that make God evil? No. An analogy I like for this: the author of a book may write in characters who do things that the author would never do. The author of the book does not deviate from his own character in doing so. God is like this author. (A witty person will now deduce, "so you're saying that God is the author of evil", and with the above qualifications, yes I am. Note that I didn't say anything about God tempting us or whatever. This is about God's sovereignty)

So now for the problem of evil. Why did God make a world where people do evil things?  Another easy one: God did it for his glory. Just read Romans 9:22-23 -- we're the pot and he's the potter. 

Someone will ask, "Couldn't God have glorified himself without all the suffering?" And the answer is easy: no. God is no fool; he invariably chooses the best possible way to glorify himself, (and he apparently revels in surprises hence our inability to know the future). God does not waste meaning; consider that he has summed up all instruction sufficient for training in righteousness in a book that fits in your pocket; yet human law has spent so much paper just on minute interests, such as taxation, that it could stack all the way to the moon and back several times.

Then the chorus returns with, "It's very bad for God to glorify himself through our suffering."  Well, first of all, remember the definitions for "good" and "evil". Everything God does is good by definition -- so, no. Secondly, a person who says this has proved that they are unregenerate -- they have overvalued human feelings and sensations (human suffering) and undervalued the glory of God. Christians under the influence of the Holy Spirit know better (see Acts 5:41). Furthermore, consider that suffering itself isn't evil; suffering is rather a consequence of evil. 

Up next, a common objection from Arminians: predestination and moral responsibility. if we are predestined to an activity, then how can we be held morally responsible? This one is also not difficult if we firm up our commitments to the prior answers. Moral responsibility is not a function of some transcendent code outside of God. It's a function of God's unchanging character. Since it is unchanging, it is also predictable -- cause and effect. This is no affront to God; God's actions are surely predictable to himself, and he commands us to count on his promises, because they are sure and will predictably come to pass. Certainly we cannot predict all of his actions -- he's infinite and we are finite; we can't comprehend enough of him to generate informed predictions about anything other than those things which he has expressed to us (his promises, his creation, etc). Consider that this is the same character from which all of nature sprang, including the cause and effect relationships upon which all of it hinges. Morality and nature are both expressions of the same God's character. 

Now, if you are predestined to sip some coffee, would you argue that it should not go into your stomach because it was predestined? That would be absurd. Moral culpability is likewise a function of cause and effect; if you steal, predestined or not, then you incur guilt by virtue of the action. Does God ever punish the innocent or acquit the guilty? No, his character, his nature, forbids it -- this is why a sacrifice was needed for our forgiveness; justice had to be done.

And finally, the chorus again: "but I didn't choose to do it if I was predestined." Well, firstly, yes you did. A "predestined choice" is still a "choice". Secondly, it doesn't matter. Just like the coffee entering your stomach as a result of your actions, moral culpability is a result of what you willed and did, and is not abdicated simply because you are predestined to will or do it.

This is where many Arminians will accidentally quote Romans 9:19b to me, or circle back to the prior point under "problem of evil" with a question like "but why did God do that?" (to glorify himself), and then "isn't God very bad to glorify himself through my sin?" (it is not wrong for God design you to deviate from his character -- see the section on God Authoring Evil), and then "isn't God very bad to be glorified by our suffering?" (you have undervalued God's glory and overvalued suffering).

Basically, moral responsibility is a function of cause and effect, along rules defined by God's character. I contest that we have zero scriptural grounds for thinking otherwise.

This leads me to my last point: the nature of duty. This has been bothering me for quite some time. I was thinking about it, and about the issue of moral responsibility, and it struck me that duty is perhaps another function of nature, like morality. Duty is clearly evidenced in scripture by statements like "husbands, love your wives", "children, honor your father and mother", and "slaves obey your masters". Duty also appears to weigh heavily into the attitude which we are required to have toward God -- "love the Lord your God with all your heart, mind, and strength". God also says, "If I am a father, where is my honor? If I am a master, where is my respect?". These relationships appear to hinge on a mechanism quite similar to morality, and it seems to me that duty is simply a facet of that same morality.

This seems like an accurate description of duty, and I believe it represents much progress toward an answer for the questions I have about duty. But if we stop with only the above, I still have some lingering dissatisfaction. I'm quite content with the discussion about what motivates morality, but duty has a unique characteristic which is not like what I think of when I consider the rest of morality, in that it is entirely dependent on relationships. That is, a lone person in an empty universe might perfectly contain, without expressing, exclusive capacity for certain kinds of non-relational righteousness (if there exists any such thing), and thereby have perfect conformance with all other parts of morality. But a lone person could not contain duty, because duty is always an obligation toward someone else. How then could God produce duty as an expression of a singular character? (That is, all things are expressions of God's character. If God's character is singular, how can the requirement for duty be an expression of that character?) I suppose he could not, and would not, except it is rather the case that God exemplifies duty by being three in one, and dutiful one to another within himself. He has true and real interpersonal relationships with the other persons of himself.

And this leads also to a question about whether there is any moral rule which is not also an expression of duty. If not, then the above relation -- duty's dependence on the trinity -- may be said to be applicable to all of morality, and the distinction between duty and morality eliminated. This last clue, I suppose, might eventually lead to a more thoroughgoing argument for Christian morality. It kinda makes me want to go buy some books by Van Till..

"Oh, how life imitates art."

There's a storm in my head right now, and I can't seem to dissipate it. I'm home alone until Thursday. Tonight I'm doing everything in my immediate power to reduce stress, and I'm dedicating my free time tomorrow and the day after to this task entirely.

Here's the music I'm into right now:

"Why don't you be more like him?"

"He's already a senior engineer. You have enough experience. Why aren't you a senior engineer yet?

"I'm sorry for comparing you to him. I won't do it again."

"I'm so glad that I'm married to someone who makes enough money for me to stay at home with Isaac."

"I'm not comparing you to him, but look at what he's doing; don't you want to do what he's done? Doesn't it show that you're not making what you're worth?"

"You should fight for a bigger raise."

"Look at how much he's making." 

I'm an engineer because it's what I like to do! I will not ruin it by transforming it into a battle for things I don't need. I would rather quit and be a freelance stick-figure artist than change jobs just for a bigger salary, or even get into an argument with anyone just to get a bigger raise.

I don't lack ambition. I place my ambition in things greater than money. I want contentment.

"Here's what I've done; see how I made progress at my job. Let's talk about how you can do this, too."

"Having heard my story, what are your thoughts? What do you think prevents you from doing as I've done?"

"[Let me tell you, at least 2 to 3 times per day, how wonderful it is that] I've provided a 600$/month flexible spending budget for my wife. She wasn't content without it, but now she's much more happy. Happy wife, happy life."

"Come on; let's finish that conversation from before. I wanna poke holes in your reason for not changing jobs. Why else don't you wanna switch and make more money?" 

"I just want you to make what I know you're worth." 

"You can get a bigger raise by switching jobs" 

I hate the rat race and I'd rather be homeless than join it!!

Anyone else wanna give me job advice?! Line up! Who else wants to tell me how much I'm worth?

I'll sooner die than want what everyone keeps telling me I'm inadequate for not having!!!! And hearing that I "should pursue it" makes me hate it all the more! Who in their right mind applies "should"s and "ought"s (moral imperatives) to financial gain? Maybe I'd have a bit of energy and motivation to pursue it if I wasn't so drained by your criticisms? Maybe It would be fun to explore, or even play against, the job market if I wasn't being measured by it.

I know that my pride alone doesn't stand a chance in a war against the USD; God help me.

Here's another good one:

"You haven't provided a secure environment for us. You aren't protecting me from the racist looks that people give me, or the impatience of strangers at the grocery store when you're not around. You're not protecting me from the noises that penetrate our apartment bedroom walls when our neighbors are loudly having sex. Simply complaining to the apartment manager, and applying for jobs out of state, wasn't enough. What are you going to do to fix it?"

"I don't trust anyone, and I can't trust anyone, and I won't trust anyone! How can I trust you?"

"You need to prove to me that you are going to be a good father for our next child. I'm glad that you walk Isaac for 1-2 hours each day, make breakfast and eat it with him each morning while I sleep, change his first diaper, and do the bedtime routine every night, but you don't act like these people I see in this youtube video. Let me show you a youtube video about a dad playing with his smart kid. See how much he's wrestling with his kid in the video? If you played with Isaac more like this, maybe he'd be more above-average than he already is!"

"You need to prove to me that you can handle more than one kid. You haven't proved yourself to me yet. If you're this tired after work, how can I expect you to have energy to give adequate attention to a second kid?"

I honestly have no idea what else I can do with the time that I have. Talk more to him? I don't think his world should be continuously narrated; I want to enjoy quiet with him, and we do that and play with each other look at each other and giggle often, and we do talk more than I talk to most other people (save Chowon alone) -- I love those times. I prefer to spend quality time with him, and it's easy to see that he enjoys it. The only thing that makes it negative, is when, from the entire opposite side of the house, a scolding tone comes, "Why aren't you talking to him more?" He's two years old! What else could I do? Wrestle with him more? I wrestle with him a little bit almost every day. How many minutes of wrestling per day before I'm a good dad?

"You should come pick up Isaac like this."

"You should go under the box fort with him right now. [I just randomly made this box fort without talking about it, and Isaac didn't even go into it until I told him to like 5 times, and I'm not going in there with my kid or yours, but you should. See, your wife agrees you should.]."

"Watch me do this; you should do it."

"This is a dad book -- you should read this to him." 

"You should have another video call with Gershom; I think Isaac would like that."

Please, tell me more about what you think my son would like. Please explain my son's character to me more. How can I better appease my wife's desire for money? Who is my wife anyway? How much money must I make before I'm a good spiritual leader in my house?

Here's another one:

No, without guile, I'm selfish for being angry with him -- angry with him for loudly suggesting over and over, in front of my wife and kid, that I entertain Isaac in the way that he's entertaining his kid (or sometimes in apparently random ways per his whim), rather than simply letting me approach my kid on my own terms -- selfish because that anger distracts me from my son. It's a mistake this experience has helped teach me to avoid.

Another one:

Maybe I'm unusually slow in my approach to Isaac... but I'm slow to approach everyone and everything. I measure my target before I engage; I prepare the room before I sit to relax; I organize all my soaps and scrubbers in advance before I clean a thing; I draw a design before I build a machine. It isn't that I don't do a thing; it's not that I don't engage with Isaac (if that were the case, then I wouldn't be engaging with Isaac as often as I am) -- I want to look at what he's doing; try to discern what he's immediately interested in and his emotional state; I want to thoughtfully develop a creative activity which matches the environment, myself, and him, all at once, and I do it at a slower pace than my wife, or her friend's husband, or her youtube subscription family. 

I feel like I keep getting intercepted en route to Isaac -- while I'm genuinely focused on him -- and accused of being inattentive.

I'm selfish for writing this blog about it. If I truly exemplified the unconditional love which God calls me to have, I would simply forgive, and having forgiven, I would have no need to vent these things. But to whom can I vent anyway? 

This blog has only two regular readers, both in eastern Europe, and I'm increasingly convinced that they're robots. 

This has always been my place to vent. Maybe it's a childish thing, to post these publically, and maybe I should grow out of it... I suppose, if I get any pushback on this post, I'll either terminate this blog or formally dedicate it, exclusively, to lighter (or perhaps more obscure) content.

Watch me making excuses for myself. Perhaps my behavior is simply inadequate.

I really don't have time to write all this. I don't have time to rest.

"Are you emotionally drained?"

Today I was thinking about and appreciating the things I learned from my family. Each of my family members afforded me a distinct and valuable influence while I was growing up. Surely it would take at least a full 18 to 30 years to describe it all, but of the gains which I hold dear and which I hope to pass on to my son,  these were on my mind today.

My sister is, and always has been, an exceptional artist, with a love for creative originality and individualism. She taught me to appreciate innovation, artistic irony, all kinds of music, and beauty in visual art. To see, even when a song sounds unappealing or a painting weird, that it might be so intentionally, and the artist can be valued, and even enjoyed for his uniqueness, because he expresses something which nobody else is expressing. Moreover, that I should strive to do things which haven't been done before,  and that simply copying others devalues my contributions to my art.

My dad taught me to enjoy different cultures, to appreciate nature, and to go further than simply enjoying a beautiful thing, but to ask what the artist intended to communicate, and to search myself and find what the art evoked in me, even if it isn't what the artist intended. Not saying "what a beautiful painting", or, "what a beautiful mountain range", but rather, "what has the artist expressed in this painting", and, "what majesty, what righteousness, has God expressed in this mountain".

My mom taught me to love words,  clear and concise expressions, logical relationships, to search out concealed meaning, and to conceal meaning in structure. She taught me to love poetry, to pay attention to the lyrics, and to value philosophical disagreements. Where my dad and sister taught me to draw meaning out of art, my mom taught me to see meaning as an art form on its own. 

My brother reinforced in me an ability to get back up after failure, to search myself for hidden strength, to do what is required without concern for my immediate preferences. He taught me to value manliness, to see dignity in it, to associate honor, integrity, and leadership with it, and to build an identity, image of God, out of my ontology.  He taught me that there is much value in striving, and that I need not be discouraged in anything. 

I am grateful for my upbringing. God, thank you for the people you put in my life. Please enable me to bless my son by modeling and teaching good character.  Surround my children with good influences like these. Bless and protect my family, lord, and guide me in instilling your righteous wisdom in them. 

"But they who slew him, unaware of coward murderers lurking nigh, and left him to the birds of air, are still alive, and they must die."

Got a lot to write here today. First thing's first: Romans 13, verse by verse. Someone recently asked for this, and I didn't have it handy. I'm not going to go into a lot of depth, I suppose. I'm just going to comment on how the verses in this chapter work together, from my perspective, with a focus on theonomy. I might later come back through and add some depth, but maybe not. Heck, I might not even send this to the person who asked for it. I'm going to write this out and sit on it for a little while, and then see how I feel about it.

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1. Let every person be subject to the governing authorities. For there is no authority except from God, and those that exist have been instituted by God.

There is no authority except from God. We all acknowledge that not everyone has authority; not everyone who claims authority has it; and not everyone whose authority is acknowledged by others has authority over "me" (or "you"). So the question for which we should seek a Biblical answer is "who has God-given authority over me?"

2 Therefore whoever resists the authorities resists what God has appointed, and those who resist will incur judgment. 

All the more reason we need to identify, with clarity, who has authority over us.

3 For rulers are not a terror to good conduct, but to bad. Would you have no fear of the one who is in authority? Then do what is good, and you will receive his approval, 

Here we have some answers to the prior question. What is a "ruler"? It is someone who terrorizes bad conduct without terrorizing good conduct. It is someone who gives approval to those who do good, and who is feared by people who do not do good. The verses here say "are not" and "you will". There's nothing equivocal about these passages, and the Bible explains exhaustively what "good conduct" means, so we can't impose our extra-biblical, cultural definition of "good conduct" on this passage. 

A ruler terrorizes "bad conduct", and the Bible defines "bad conduct". 

A ruler approves of "good conduct", and the Bible defines "good conduct".

We also know that the means of terrorizing bad conduct and approving good conduct can, themselves, be either "bad" or "good". So it doesn't make sense for a ruler to terrorize bad conduct in a bad way, or else he should then terrorize himself.

4 for he is God's servant for your good. But if you do wrong, be afraid, for he does not bear the sword in vain. For he is the servant of God, an avenger who carries out God's wrath on the wrongdoer. 

Why does the ruler approve of good, and terrorize evil? It's because "he is God's servant for your good". Again, more direct language is used here. It says, "he is", and "he does". This is how we know who a ruler is.

Once again, it doesn't make sense for a ruler to carry out God's wrath on wrongdoers in an unjust way (by giving unjust penalties), because injustice is, itself, wrongdoing.  Likewise, if he expresses his approval in an evil or unjust way, then he is only a ruler if he must carry out God's wrath on himself. So, a ruler is in all respects subject to God's precepts concerning good and evil.

5 Therefore one must be in subjection, not only to avoid God's wrath but also for the sake of conscience. 

Not only to avoid God's wrath, issued by the ruler, but also for the sake of conscience -- because we should not resist him who God has appointed. And, I think our conscience also compels us because obedience to a ruler is obedience to God's law. Under what circumstances would any person have opportunity to resist a ruler? 

Would we resist a ruler while he is giving us approval? How do you resist approval?

The only opportunity for resistance is if the ruler is penalizing us for wrongdoing, and if that is the case then we have already violated our conscience by wrongdoing, so subjection to God-given authority is in all respects subjection to God's commands defining good and evil, which are in scripture.

6 For because of this you also pay taxes, for the authorities are ministers of God, attending to this very thing.

Taxes are a Biblical thing -- the Old Testament law included all kinds of taxation for maintenance of the temple, as well as for public welfare (e.g. Deut 14:28-29, 26:12). However, it should be noted that there is a distinction between the taxes we see in the Old Testament and the taxes most commonly seen in modern government. There is no civil penalty for failure to pay taxes in God's law. Therefore, God's law being ultimately just, the civil government (a ruler) has no just means to extract compulsory taxes from its people.

So, why do we pay taxes? Not only to avoid God's wrath, but for the sake of conscience. Paying taxes is a moral and conscientious endeavor. And what should a ruler do with that tax money? Minister, as defined in God's good and just law.

7 Pay to all what is owed to them: taxes to whom taxes are owed, revenue to whom revenue is owed, respect to whom respect is owed, honor to whom honor is owed.

Now, in a just government, naturally, taxes are owed according to God's good moral precepts. However, in a secular government, especially one such as the modern U.S., where fiat money is exchanged against unfulfillable promises by the U.S. government (for lack of a standard), and the U.S. presidents are on our bills, we know that every such dollar belongs to the U.S. government, and is simply borrowed by us. They've successfully transformed promissory notes of value into debt-notes, whereby we owe everything we have to the U.S. government, and if we don't pay tribute with it in every transaction, and on a regular basis, the government will repossess what we have until they are satisfied. As long as we are Americans, living in America, we are trading in American goods, and so we owe America our taxes and revenue. The theonomic vision is a sort of escape from that; a government in which humans do not claim or exert ownership over everything you possess, but which recognizes that Jesus has that ownership.

8 Owe no one anything, except to love each other, for the one who loves another has fulfilled the law. 

Right. Love God and love neighbor; "on these two commandments rests all of the law and the prophets". How do I love my neighbor? I do not sin against him. I do not commit any crime against him. And see, this is confirmed by verse 9:

9 For the commandments, “You shall not commit adultery, You shall not murder, You shall not steal, You shall not covet,” and any other commandment, are summed up in this word: “You shall love your neighbor as yourself.” 

Not just the ten commandments, some of which are quoted here, but "and any other commandment". They are all summed up in "love". How do I love my neighbor when he is the victim of a crim? I look to the commandments. The commandments tell us how we should protect the victim, how the thief can be brought to a judge and made to repay the victim, etc. etc.. The law explains to us how to love God and neighbor.

10 Love does no wrong to a neighbor; therefore love is the fulfilling of the law.

See above. If I neglect my neighbor in his time of need, when he needs justice because someone else is doing wrong to him, then I have done him harm. How do I not neglect my neighbor? I pursue justice. (Leviticus 5:1, Proverbs 24:11, Ezekiel 3:16-21, 33:1-9)

11 Besides this you know the time, that the hour has come for you to wake from sleep. For salvation is nearer to us now than when we first believed. 12 The night is far gone; the day is at hand. So then let us cast off the works of darkness and put on the armor of light. 13 Let us walk properly as in the daytime, not in orgies and drunkenness, not in sexual immorality and sensuality, not in quarreling and jealousy. 14 But put on the Lord Jesus Christ, and make no provision for the flesh, to gratify its desires.

I'm going to take a shortcut here because these verses, while important,  diverge from the topic of the point I generally find myself having to defend with regard to Romans 13. Verses 11-14 describe how Christ's presence, the nearness of his salvation to us, and our responsibility to "put on the Lord Jesus Christ", confirm our obligation to obey the law. The passage describes how, since we are saved, we should behave well. We all agree,  and this passage affirms, good behavior doesn't save us, but it is what we ought to do because we are saved. Since it is day time, we wake up and walk in the light. We have Jesus, we have his precepts and laws, let's obey them.

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I recently suffered a minor concussion,  and I'm not supposed to be spending a lot of time on my computer or on the phone ... but it's kinda unavoidable for me because of my job.  I have a doctor's appointment next week where I'll talk with my primary about it in more depth. Hopefully it's no big deal. I have some intermittent dizziness,  nausea,  and headaches. It's a little exciting honestly,  I've never had a concussion before (afaik), so it's fun to think about the relationship between the incident and the effects.  Life is an adventure. 

Now that that's out of the way. I have the next transcription from my notebook here. I'm gonna call this one "demiform". I've cut quite a bit out of this poem because I'm shocked at myself for having written it.  More reason to burn that notebook when I'm done with the transcriptions. Nonetheless,  I like the poem,  so I'm transcribing here what I want to keep. 

--

A voice rings out from nothing

I love you but I have no power to love.

I am the ink, the page, the meaning.

I'm abstract, limitless, literally anything you want.

I exist only in your mind, and therefore I exist.

Do I no less feel as my felings are conceived first by you?

I am ontologically bound to append the word "imagined" to all my attributes, but aren't you as well,  persisting only by the word of His power?

Why let that stop us?

Man cannot serve two masters

Man cannot love the form and the truth together

--

I was thinking about what we are,  God's will made manifest by his power,  for his glory,  cumulatively the perfect and best means by which God will achieve his pleasure.  We were imagined by God in eternity past.  And I was toying around with that and Plato's girlfriend -- the perfect girlfriend for Plato, who perfectly exemplified compatibility with Plato in every way. If she is conceivable,  then she exists in the realm of forms,  and communicates with mankind through mediating ideas (according to Plato).

There are,  of course,  two problems with Plato's girlfriend: first,  that Plato's whole system was bunk; but more fun to think about, that she is inconceivable.  Nobody will be happy, or improved,  by spending time with someone who is in every way predictable.  Plato wants stimulating discussion -- he shares ideas in hopes of learning from his students.  How can he learn from them if they are, in every respect, conceived of by him, and therefore predictable? One might say he could learn by observing himself through them,  but he can make predictions of that sort without their physical presence, and if learning about himself is enough to occupy Plato for the rest of his life,  then does she become viable again? 

For that matter,  she need not even be a human form,  but can be a combination of every art and expression that manifests from him.  And now we have Plato the island,  or maybe the narcissist of sorts,  satisfying all his emotional needs by imagining that his form-world girlfriend is manifesting and expressing herself every time he does any kind of art or creative activity which benefits him. Man in an intimate relationship with his hobbies. 

"Ah! Well known woods, and mountains, and skies, 

With the very clouds!--ye are lost to my eyes. 

I seek ye vainly, and see in your place

The shadowy tempest that stops through space, 

A whirling ocean that fills the wall

Of crystal Heaven and buries all. 

And I, cut off from the world,  remain

Alone with the terrible hurricane."

I've several times fantasized about how I would present my views on theonomy to my brother's church. My brother attends a very devoted, charismatic congregation. His church is of particular interest to me because its members are passionate, and they are continually experiencing and evidencing the blessings of God in their lives and in their relationships to one another (from my perspective anyway). I think this is attributable to the grace God has given them to passionately desire closeness with God. The people there  really want to do right by God, and they're prepared to pursue closeness with God in innovative ways, (hence the charismatic leaning). Furthermore , my experiences with them indicate that they're very concerned about the political environment around them, and are genuinely seeking answers from God about how best to approach the culture. (Indeed, I believe the culture in America is very nearly ripe for a theonomic establishment to put its feet in the door, and some, taking the restorationist approach, which I dislike and disagree with, have already begun to do so, and I praise God for their efforts). I would like nothing more than to spend an extended period of time with my brother's church, discussing the theonomic approach to ethics and civil government, to determine with them whether it seems to be supported by scripture, and whether it pleases the spirit, and whether they would be willing to pursue it. Something tells me that several members in their congregation would be open to it, and I am absolutely confident that all Christians who study the law in full will, as I have, find it to be refreshing and wonderful. 

Today the thought of a presentation weighed so heavily on my mind that I could not help but sit to write it out. I had some thought experiments in mind, which I would love to see them respond to. Here's what I was thinking:

Is Christ king? Everyone will agree, yes he is. "No king but Christ?" Yes. I'm confident that everyone in my brother's church would agree with that. They're the kind of full-blooded Americans who like nothing more than to emphasize their loyalty to God over government; freedom over tyranny. Everyone will definitely agree, there is no king but Christ. But is Christ really king? Of course. Really though? Yeah, we all just agreed, he is. Can there be two kings? No. We all just agreed, no king but Christ.

What's a king? A king is someone with supreme authority; the ruler of a nation; the head of a government.

So what if someone else says, "I'm king"? Clearly, they're not. No king but Christ. 

So what if they change the title, and say "I'm emperor?" or "I'm lord" (after all, there are many lords; landlords etc. A lord is just an owner over a place or people). Still, they are not. Just like the Christians said to Caesar, "there is no lord but Christ", we also say, "there is no king but Christ", and "there is no emperor but Christ". Christ is the only and final head of government. The problem isn't the name being used; it's the arrogation of authority. Only Christ has the authority which Caesar is attempting to claim.

In Rome, when Caesar commanded the early Christian church to say "Caesar is lord" and they refused, saying "only Christ is lord," were they right to do so? Yes. Changing the title from "king" to "lord" doesn't change the problem; only Christ has that authority and that position. Nobody owns them and their land except Christ. There is no king but Christ.

Well, what if there was a council of ten Caesars? Should the Christians say, "the council is lord?" No, only Jesus is lord. What if the council consisted of a thousand people, or ten thousand, or a million. Could we then say, "the council is lord?" No, we couldn't. 

So what if they change the title again. Rather than saying "the council is lord", since the council consists of so many people, they simply say "the people are lord". Is that ok? Clearly not. But suppose they change the title again. Now they say, "the people are a democracy", and they elect a council which they call a republic. Has our situation changed?

No. The problem still exists. Moving the kingship to more people, rearranging the ownership of that authority, is still a problem, as long as the authority still resides in man instead of in Christ.

But men do have some authority, right? The Bible says there is no authority except that which is instituted by God (That's Romans 13). So what are the boundaries of this authority? Well, Romans 13 explains a little about what an authority instituted by God is. Let's read it:

1 Let every person be subject to the governing authorities. For there is no authority except from God, and those that exist have been instituted by God. 2 Therefore whoever resists the authorities resists what God has appointed, and those who resist will incur judgment. 3 For rulers are not a terror to good conduct, but to bad. Would you have no fear of the one who is in authority? Then do what is good, and you will receive his approval, 4 for he is God's servant for your good. But if you do wrong, be afraid, for he does not bear the sword in vain. For he is the servant of God, an avenger who carries out God's wrath on the wrongdoer. 5 Therefore one must be in subjection, not only to avoid God's wrath but also for the sake of conscience. 6 For because of this you also pay taxes, for the authorities are ministers of God, attending to this very thing. 7 Pay to all what is owed to them: taxes to whom taxes are owed, revenue to whom revenue is owed, respect to whom respect is owed, honor to whom honor is owed.

Paul writes here: "Rulers are not a terror to good, but to bad. ... do what is good and you will receive his approval, for he is God's servant for your good. ... he is the servant of God, and avenger who carries out God's wrath on the wrongdoer." (emphasis mine). The terms Paul uses here are not "should be" or "may do". They're "is", and "does". Paul is explaining what an authority instituted by God is. An authority instituted by God is a terror to bad conduct, and an approver of good conduct.

So then, there are authorities instituted by God. How do we know who they are? Well, first of all, they approve of good conduct and terrorize evil conduct. But, as we established above, they also cannot claim to be the final authorities. There is no king but Christ, so Christ is the head of government. The democracy isn't the head of government. The republic isn't the head of government. Only the king is the head. So, whatever authority we have or institute must be subject to the final authority: Jesus.

So, how do we identify people who have authority given to them by God, and are subject to Jesus? Who is Paul telling us to submit to, here?

Suppose someone claims to have authority. This person is a terror to good conduct, and not to bad. He has not submitted himself to Jesus. He has only 1 follower who acknowledges his authority. Do you have to subject yourself to him? Suppose he has 2 followers? Suppose he has 10? Suppose he annexes the land in your neighborhood tomorrow. Should you resist? Suppose he has 100, 1000, or 1 million followers? At what point does his authority over you come from God, such that Paul's command in Romans 13 applies to him, and you should obey whatever he tells you to do (or not do), as long as it isn't directly a command for you to sin? 

Well, not at any point, no matter how many followers he has, or what claims to ownership and authority he makes. He is a terror to good conduct and not evil, so he does not match the description of a ruler in Romans 13, so he is not a ruler. He has no authority given to him by God. Whatever we do for him is only to keep the peace, out of love for our neighbors.

Suppose some people get together and they set up a democratic republic. They say, "this is a government under God." But then, their government terrorizes good and promotes evil. Have they really subjected themselves to their final authority? No, they haven't. They're "under God" in name only. Just like before, they have no authority.

OK, so suppose there is a government which terrorizes evil and promotes good, but the way they terrorize evil is, itself, evil. I'll give an extreme example to drive home my point. Suppose, for theft, the government instituted the "rape penalty". A person steals something, and so the government sexually assaults them in response. That's crazy, right? It's unjust. The government has terrorized the evil of theft by commanding its enforcers to do another kind of evil. This government does not terrorize all evil; it promotes evils, so it is not exercising authority given to it by Jesus. Inasmuch as it promotes evil, it acts without authority.

But wait, doesn't every penalty consist of a negative action which normal citizens should otherwise not do to one another? If I say the government can force a man to repay seven times what he stole, then isn't the government taking stuff from him without his consent? It's the "theft penalty". Is the government doing something evil here?

What's the difference between the latter action and the former? Is the former penalty wrong because sexuality is sacred? Suppose we institute the death penalty instead for theft. No, that's disproportionately harsh. Ok, so then what is a proportionate penalty? Should the thief simply have to return the money, plus that amount again? This will make the thief feel as though he has lost something, but if that's all we're aiming for then we don't need to make him pay so much. And if we aim to compensate the victim for the emotional harm done to them, then maybe we are paying too little. Every dollar off-the-mark we are is an injustice, an evil, that our government has promoted. 

We can't circumvent the matter by proposing another type of penalty. Suppose we lock the thief in a room and have the victim pay for his living expenses for the next few years by tax money. Is it just or unjust? Is this a proportionate penalty? Who is up to the task of evaluating that man's freedom and time? Every ounce of freedom lost to that man, which is lost disproportionately to his crime, is evil, and the government which does so acts without authority.

Someone will say that I have set my aim too high. There's no perfect government. How can we know what is right? 

We can't say that the Bible hasn't given us adequate information to handle this scenario, because the Bible says about itself that the scriptures are "sufficient to thoroughly equip the man of God for every good work", and the Bible makes very clear that justice is good, and doing justice is a good work. If running a government in a bad way is an evil work (and we all agree the rape penalty is evil), then the government is not morally-neutral. So executing just penalties at the right time, doing justice, is a good work. The Bible must contain words which instruct and equip us for this task. And if it does, and if we can know it (if it is sufficient to equip us then its contents must be learnable), then it is our obligation, our solemn duty before God, to strive for that justice which God has revealed to us. 

Someone will say, "but we're saved by faith, not works." That's true, but just because we're saved, can we ignore God's commands? Should we go on in sin, saying "we're saved by our faith"? The notion is so ridiculous that I won't devote my time to it.

OK. Now, let's examine what we have. Where does the Bible say what a just government should do with a thief? Where is it written?

It is written in the Old Testament Law. It's laid out for us in Exodus 22. Why should we compromise on this? Is there some group of people out there claiming to have authority, telling us we can't do justice? By what authority do they say that we cannot do justice? 

Are they a government which has authority if they forbid justice? And do they have authority if they don't submit themselves to God? No and no. Who is our government? Does the Bible have anything to say about how a government is established, and how it should be structured? Yeah! It says a lot about it! Where does it say that? Exodus 18 and Deuteronomy 1. 

If we say that these laws have no relevance to us today, then where does the Bible give us "relevant" instruction on these good works? Nowhere else! If we can't use what the Bible has said here, then it is insufficient to instruct the man of God who has a job as a police man or judge, when he should make a determination on how to penalize the thief or the murderer.

Does the Bible say anything about how to properly run a legislative system? Yes! Deuteronomy 4:2 and Deuteronomy 12:32 explain the proper legislature in exhaustive detail.

That's what I want people to see. Wherever our Government is not directly informed by scripture, wherever it has not submitted itself to God, it is no government; it has no authority.

Now, all that said, this is an incomplete presentation. A theonomic government is established peacefully, and the Bible also contains instructions on how to properly establish a Biblical government in the context of a secular state, and I've written some lengthy discourse on that in another place (not on my blog). I'll repost the whole thing here if that other place works out in the way I hope; if not, I'll rewrite a summary for my blog.

"Chains have round our country pressed,

And cowards have betrayed her"