Religion and the Rule of Law
Religion and the secular rule of law have much in common – especially under a constitutional system. Both oblige those under each to respectfully know and, to the best of their ability, follow the rules set forth.
In the secular world the rule of law is important because it provides stability and when applied consistently it permits both people and businesses to know what is expected of them on a regular basis. The rule of law when applied to constitutional matters is the highest form of law and is why there are courts of appeals to aid in the interpretation of the constitutional laws.
This rule of law is why our system is a stable as it is, especially compared with dictatorships, because even the most benevolent of dictators still rules on the whim and not the written law. Would you want to live or open a business when you must keep a dictator pleased lest he comes down on you with a heavy hand? It would be even less pleasing if it happened to you after you saw others getting away with it. No one would invest in a place like that and as such the nation would be in peril.
Are all laws good or even just? Of course not, but a lack of consistent and expected application is by far the crueler form.
With this in mind and centuries of proof to support it, we look at God and see that those who worship and hold God dear obey a spiritual rule of law. Jewish Scholars have found 613 laws in the Old Testament that are to be followed if a Jew is to be considered holy in the eyes of God. Some are obscure, some are obvious and very much part of Christian faith as well. Different Christian sects (and Jewish for that matter) have their own rules appended to these laws while removing some of the laws they do not feel are as important anymore.
Not matter what, there are certain laws and rules that all Christians and Jews follow and can be expected to follow in their day-to-day lives. This gives a sense of community and stability – both of which we can see as being very important for the development and advancement of the society in which they belong.
Where then does the person without God turn for guidance and stability? Nowhere. All decisions and judgments are based on their own brand of right and wrong, good or bad, love and hate. Each person being a set of standards unto themselves. This creates the unpredictability of the modern left we see today. If you are a religious person the odds are high that your behavior will be predictable – not always because we all make poor decisions… sometimes knowingly and sometimes unknowingly. In the end, that person can be corrected and persuaded to understand why what they did may be wrong.
When someone lives by their own set of standards that are independent of others and even kept from view in fear of being criticized, how can one be corrected or persuaded? More instability. The person without God becomes a dictator for their own life and by ruling on the whim, on the spur of the moment; it is easy to see why the chaos around them exists. They refuse to judge others as being good or bad and in this way they also tend to associate with those who do not hold any of the same ambitions, desires, nor beliefs they do. Even more instability results.
They can look and see the ‘unthinking sheep’ of the religious communities and they view them with scorn not because those without religion have it better, but because they have it worse. These ‘unthinking sheep’ are actually quite sophisticated people who know what they want, are willing to sacrifice, what to me is “unneeded freedom”, for the stability and comfort of people who feel the same way.
This is not to say that everyone feels THE SAME WAY, but in the end people of a congregation of any type all have the basically same idea as to where they wish to head and have a game plan as to how to get there and it is that ‘same way’ which is important and meaningful.
Where does the average leftist want to go? Does the average leftist who is without religion want a better world? Perhaps. But how so? The average leftist is not willing to fight for it. The average leftist is not willing to sacrifice for it. The average leftist is a splinter in the larger leftist movement as a whole and this movement can not have a real game plan because there is no consensus as to where to go nor how to get there.
It is this ‘Balkanization’ that we see today. All the hyphenated-Americans are a result of leftist ‘ideals’. People must feel like victims and people must not like the status quo. At one time there were many victims in this nation and the status quo was not so desirable for many. We’ve worked on it and we’re making it better so the left has to keep finding things to hate and to vilify. We work on it within the system of the rule of law. We do not need to riot, protest violently, nor call for so many other things leftist do.
When America’s Founding Fathers wrote the Constitution they understood the importance of all of these things and no matter what faith they may have been they were all men of faith. Lo and behold despite this faith they managed not to turn the nation into a theocracy, but yet we still here the cries from the left that this nation may become a theocracy with the likes of President Bush. This nation is too stable and too well rooted for that to happen… unless you tear down set standard of ethics and morality, then anything can happen because everything is equally ‘good’.
In the secular world the rule of law is important because it provides stability and when applied consistently it permits both people and businesses to know what is expected of them on a regular basis. The rule of law when applied to constitutional matters is the highest form of law and is why there are courts of appeals to aid in the interpretation of the constitutional laws.
This rule of law is why our system is a stable as it is, especially compared with dictatorships, because even the most benevolent of dictators still rules on the whim and not the written law. Would you want to live or open a business when you must keep a dictator pleased lest he comes down on you with a heavy hand? It would be even less pleasing if it happened to you after you saw others getting away with it. No one would invest in a place like that and as such the nation would be in peril.
Are all laws good or even just? Of course not, but a lack of consistent and expected application is by far the crueler form.
With this in mind and centuries of proof to support it, we look at God and see that those who worship and hold God dear obey a spiritual rule of law. Jewish Scholars have found 613 laws in the Old Testament that are to be followed if a Jew is to be considered holy in the eyes of God. Some are obscure, some are obvious and very much part of Christian faith as well. Different Christian sects (and Jewish for that matter) have their own rules appended to these laws while removing some of the laws they do not feel are as important anymore.
Not matter what, there are certain laws and rules that all Christians and Jews follow and can be expected to follow in their day-to-day lives. This gives a sense of community and stability – both of which we can see as being very important for the development and advancement of the society in which they belong.
Where then does the person without God turn for guidance and stability? Nowhere. All decisions and judgments are based on their own brand of right and wrong, good or bad, love and hate. Each person being a set of standards unto themselves. This creates the unpredictability of the modern left we see today. If you are a religious person the odds are high that your behavior will be predictable – not always because we all make poor decisions… sometimes knowingly and sometimes unknowingly. In the end, that person can be corrected and persuaded to understand why what they did may be wrong.
When someone lives by their own set of standards that are independent of others and even kept from view in fear of being criticized, how can one be corrected or persuaded? More instability. The person without God becomes a dictator for their own life and by ruling on the whim, on the spur of the moment; it is easy to see why the chaos around them exists. They refuse to judge others as being good or bad and in this way they also tend to associate with those who do not hold any of the same ambitions, desires, nor beliefs they do. Even more instability results.
They can look and see the ‘unthinking sheep’ of the religious communities and they view them with scorn not because those without religion have it better, but because they have it worse. These ‘unthinking sheep’ are actually quite sophisticated people who know what they want, are willing to sacrifice, what to me is “unneeded freedom”, for the stability and comfort of people who feel the same way.
This is not to say that everyone feels THE SAME WAY, but in the end people of a congregation of any type all have the basically same idea as to where they wish to head and have a game plan as to how to get there and it is that ‘same way’ which is important and meaningful.
Where does the average leftist want to go? Does the average leftist who is without religion want a better world? Perhaps. But how so? The average leftist is not willing to fight for it. The average leftist is not willing to sacrifice for it. The average leftist is a splinter in the larger leftist movement as a whole and this movement can not have a real game plan because there is no consensus as to where to go nor how to get there.
It is this ‘Balkanization’ that we see today. All the hyphenated-Americans are a result of leftist ‘ideals’. People must feel like victims and people must not like the status quo. At one time there were many victims in this nation and the status quo was not so desirable for many. We’ve worked on it and we’re making it better so the left has to keep finding things to hate and to vilify. We work on it within the system of the rule of law. We do not need to riot, protest violently, nor call for so many other things leftist do.
When America’s Founding Fathers wrote the Constitution they understood the importance of all of these things and no matter what faith they may have been they were all men of faith. Lo and behold despite this faith they managed not to turn the nation into a theocracy, but yet we still here the cries from the left that this nation may become a theocracy with the likes of President Bush. This nation is too stable and too well rooted for that to happen… unless you tear down set standard of ethics and morality, then anything can happen because everything is equally ‘good’.
posted by Edward W. Prather at 08:28
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