Law and Love: Doing the Ethical Dance
By Charles Wellborn
[Dr. Charles Wellborn is Professor of Religion Emeritus, Florida State University and for 20 years was Dean of the Overseas Campus in London.]
Years ago my friend, Dr. Herbert Bromberg, a Jewish rabbi, told me a fascinating story out of his people`s history. Some medieval Jewish congregations in Eastern Europe once practiced an unusual form of worship. At one point in the service the rabbi would lift the Torah, the symbol of the sacred Law, from its resting place and, holding it high above his head, would dance. His movements were traditional and strictly prescribed. The dance was always performed in exactly the same way. When the rabbi had finished this section of the service, he would replace the Torah. Moving to another lower section of the synagogue, he would again begin to dance. This time, however, the dance was different. No longer prescribed or planned, it was a spontaneous, improvised series of movements-a dance of freedom.
As I reflect on this story, I am reminded of certain features of modern popular music and dance. As a university administrator for many years, part of my responsibility has involved attendance on student dances and discos. As I have listened to the music and watched the couples on the dance floor, I have often been visited by a wave of nostalgia-a symptom, no doubt, of age. I long for the music of my youth: big bands, tuneful melodies, and the sentimental rhyming lyrics of "Stardust" and "Deep Purple." Today`s popular music often seems to have no discernible melodic line, and the words are frequently crude, banal, and repetitive. What matters almost exclusively is "beat," a rhythmic pulsation that dominates the music. I have sometimes been kept awake late at night by the excessively loud music played by my student next-door neighbors. What penetrated the walls of my bedroom was not a melody or a lyric but a pounding "beat."
Modern dance displays similar characteristics. The popular dances of my younger days were waltzes, fox trots, two-steps. A prescribed pattern dictated the movements in each dance. I seem to remember that the once ubiquitous Arthur Murray dance studios had footprints painted on the floor designed to aid beginners in making the exact steps. In today`s dancing, by contrast few if any of the movements are prescribed. The dancers rarely touch each other. Each person dances individually, freely, spontaneously, improvising as he or she goes. One restriction remains. The dancers must conform to the "beat," the underlying rhythm of the song being played.
In using these illustrations I am not ascribing undue significance to the dance. How young people dance may have some importance in understanding culture, but that is not my concern. Rather, I want to use these observations as metaphors for the Christian`s obligation to act responsibly in demanding moral situations. In making moral choices, all of us are frequently faced with the difficult task of balancing two essential standards-Law and Love. We are not free to ignore either of these standards. Our proper response in such situations is what I want to call "the ethical dance."
I have pointed out the dominant role of the "beat" in today`s popular dance music. In my metaphor the "beat" represents the role of the moral Law. I do not refer here to statutory or governmental law. That is human law, and human law is constantly being changed, amended, or repealed. The divine Law is always there, unchanging and implacable, etched, in Old Testament terms, in "tablets of stone." Thus, Jesus, as a legitimate bearer of the Divine Word and an incarnation of a new moral dispensation, never denied or ignored the Law. Instead, he went beyond the Law; he "fulfilled" it. His revolutionary moral stance involved a drastic reinterpretation of what it means to be "good," and, therefore, a radical reshaping of the Law itself. He taught that the Law must everywhere and always be seen and understood in the light of a new and far more demanding ethical standard, that of Love. This is not to say that there was no love in the Hebrew scriptures or in the Jewish handling of the Law. But Jesus placed a special kind of Love-what we have come to call agape, a totally unselfish and unmerited Love-at the apex of the moral pyramid, overshadowing all else. In honestly facing the moral requirements of the Law, as redefined by Love, those who are committed to the Christ are called to "dance"-to work out in concrete real-life situations the often difficult moral equation involving the "beat" of the Law and the free spontaneity of Love.
The essence of the Law is most clearly spelled out for us in the Old Testament Decalogue, the Ten Commandments. The Commandments are a terse distillation of the fundamental moral perimeters of a humane and godly society. God gave the Commandments to Israel so that by adherence to them, his people might be a "holy nation," operating as a continuing moral example to the world around them. But the Commandments cannot have been conceived as a comprehensive or detailed guide for every moral action. They mark out areas of transgression and moral obligation, but they do not address the intricacies, which arise in actual human conduct. They prohibit murder but do not attempt to spell out exactly what murder is. They condemn "false witness," but give us no detailed explanation of such witness. God left his people with the responsibility of interpreting the detailed implications of his fundamental moral commands. Israel`s attempt to fulfill that responsibility resulted in the meticulous complexity of the Old Testament ceremonial and legal system. Indeed, the Old Testament delineation of the Law essayed a finally impossible task-to anticipate every possible moral situation and provide a clear and unarguable legal provision, leaving no room for human confusion or deviation.
The essence of the Commandments is as important for today`s world as it was for Israel. Those injunctions still define the moral limits of a functioning humane and godly society, and any individual, community, or nation choosing to ignore those limits chooses risk and ruin. Throw away the underlying structure of the Law and the result will be not just moral anarchy, but a total cultural collapse. I am no Chicken Little, trumpeting, on flimsy evidence, the news that the sky is falling, but I must admit to a serious concern and disquiet about the well-being of our American society when I see on television the devastating scenes of the Littleton, Colorado, school horror. A parade of experts bemoans the event and asks over and over again, "Why?" No one seems to have an answer, but a forthright and honest look at how far our society has drifted away from the moorings of the moral Law might offer some clues.
Be that as it may, it is important to remember that, basic as the Commandments are, they are not God`s final word in the moral realm. When Jesus was asked, "What is the great commandment of the Law?" He responded without hesitation, "You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your mind and with all your soul." But He did not stop there. He turned that commandment over like a coin and read the reverse side. "And the second is like it. You shall love your neighbor as yourself."
With those words Jesus clearly set out a new moral standard based on the ultimate supremacy of Love. Moral obligation involves two dimensions of Love-God-love and neighbor-love. The two loves are inseparable. In the final analysis, while we must listen to the "beat" of the Law, the moral quality of any act or decision is measured by the dimensions of Love. Thus, to live the good life requires the constant balancing of Love and Law. Such balancing calls for a careful interpretation of the meaning of the Law in the light of Love. It requires that the interpreter be constantly open to the freedom and spontaneity which must characterize agape as it is applied in real-life- not theoretical-situations. Such responses constitute the "ethical dance."
In a recent issue of this journal (vol.5, no. 2, April, 1999, pp. 16-21) Gilbert C. Meilander, Jr. offered a persuasive argument against the Kantian concept that, for an act to be considered moral, it must stand the test of universalization; that is, a conception of what would happen if every person in a similar situation made precisely the same decision. He called attention to a complex range of personal decisions, such as, for example, the choice of vocation, that do not lend themselves to that test. While making this point effectively, Professor Meilander also concedes that there are certain moral duties "which bind all of us and which we are free to omit only at our moral peril." He goes on to give as an example of such inescapable duties as those enjoined in the Decalogue.
Meilander`s contribution is valuable in shedding light on the important differences that exist among various types of moral decisions and the consequent differences in how various decisions ought to be made. I do wish to raise a caveat, perhaps unfairly, since Meilander does not really address this particular issue. Like him, I have argued for the universal and unchanging nature of the basic moral Law. But to acknowledge this is not in any sense to diminish or limit the individual`s responsibility to give even those fundamental commandments a thorough bath in Love. In making a decision in any concrete situation, which involves these basic injunctions, the decision-maker faces two different responsibilities. He or she must say "yes~~ or "no" to the moral absolute of the commandment. But he or she must then go further. It is necessary to decide upon the precise human actions, which are compatible with that preliminary "yes." It is at this point, I believe, that Love enters into the process. "In the light of my `yes` to the commandment, what is my appropriate and loving action?" So far as Meilander is concerned, I think I would argue more strongly than he that agape-God-love and neighbor-love-must be brought to bear as the primary element in every moral decision, even those personal ones involving such things as vocational choice.
Perhaps an example will clarify what I am trying to say. The sixth Commandment clearly establishes the sanctity and value of each human life. It categorically forbids murder. I believe that every sincere Christian must say "yes" to that command. But the affirmation of the Commandment as a moral absolute does not solve many important moral problems. The Christian decision-maker is left with the responsibility of working out through the use of reason within the spiritual environment of the Christian community, which human acts constitutes "murder" and thus are forbidden by the commandment. Is, for instance, capital punishment "murder"? There is no prepackaged or universally agreed on Christian answer to that question. The believer must find a personal answer.
A particularly painful example of this process is the vexing question of the morality of abortion. Is every abortion "murder" and therefore unequivocally forbidden by the sixth commandment? Some Christians take the position that inviolate life and personhood begins at the moment of conception. This is essentially, though not exclusively, the official Roman Catholic position. If one believes this, and further believes that the preservation of the life of the fetus at any stage of its development takes moral precedence over all other considerations, it follows naturally that any abortion is "murder." That is a fairly simple solution of a moral problem.
The fact is, however, that many sincere Christians quite emphatically do not agree with that interpretation. For one thing, they see the current state of scientific knowledge, so far as it relates to the personhood of the fetus, as a "mixed bag." For another, they view the fetus in terms of the development of personhood, rather than simply biologically. And for a third thing, they want to factor into any abortion decision what they consider to be other important concerns, such as the freedom of a woman to control her own body and the future well-being of a child brought into the world when an abortion is not performed.
I am not here concerned to take sides in this thorny issue. I am rather trying to illustrate two things: first, the moral responsibility of any Christian is not completed simply by saying "yes" to a moral absolute, and second, the implications of that "yes" must be carefully worked out in a process under-girded by the primary role of God-love and neighbor-love.
In setting out this position I do not think I am departing from the teaching of the Scriptures. To do the "ethical dance" is an essential part of our human-ness, a state of being that derives directly from our belief that we are created "in the image of God." The reflected God-image in humanity is a spiritual one, and a basic component of that image is the ability to make free moral choices. If we have no such freedom, we are less than human-part of the lower non-human echelons of creation. Without moral freedom there can be no such thing as Love, in the New Testament sense of the word, only instinctive feelings or simple lust. In the Genesis story Adam and Eve used their moral freedom to disobey God. Though God was saddened by that decision, he did not override it. He allowed the built-in consequences of that disobedience to operate. Adam and Eve were expelled from the Garden. Innocence was replaced by guilt. The consequences of sin or wrong moral choice are written into the fabric of the disobedient act. But unless there is the genuine possibility of wrong choice, there is no moral freedom and, therefore, no "human-ness."
"Human-ness" involves much more than the free power to choose. God did not leave his human creatures without resources for making right choices. Our moral decisions are not simple "stabs in the dark." For one thing, God has given us the Law, fulfilling the functions set out above. A second gift from God is the human ability to reason, Christians believe that the universe is one of order, a planned entity. Such a conviction is not the simple-minded conviction that, at any moment, this is the best of all possible worlds. God`s order is constantly being upset by man`s disobedience, but we believe that the patterns of the Divine Mind are reflected, albeit in a limited way, in the mind-patterns of human beings. The human power to reason is a gift of God and, therefore, a valuable resource for the making of proper moral decisions. If our logic and reason do not somehow reflect an ultimate reality, all human life is nothing more than a series of unrelated or accidental incidents, linked loosely by secondary causal factors but without any final meaning. Thus, "life is a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing." Of course, there are many people who deny any ultimate meaning to the universe, but it is paradoxical that these thinkers, in reaching that conclusion, are employing the method of reason. In other words, they are using human reason to deny any final universal reason, a logically flawed position.
Human reason, employed in the making of moral decisions, provides a tool by which we can attempt to measure the consequences of any action and include in the decision-making process as many relevant factors as possible. Reason also helps us to be aware of the limitations of our freedom. We are not free to do anything we want in a real-life decision-making situation. There are always circumstances which limit our available choices. "Politics," said Reinhold Niebuhr, "is the art of the possible." So, too, is moral decision making. To some degree our scope of moral action is always limited by the circumstances. Reason aids us in discerning those limits.
Reason alone, however, does not complete the picture of lXhumanity created in the image of God. God has made us not only reasoning beings, but spiritual ones with the capacity to relate to the Creator and to draw guidance from that source. It is this spiritual capacity which allows us to realize that, in the area of moral choice, human reason is not sufficient. Pure reason can often lead to inhuman and unloving moral decisions. Even so carefully worked out a logical concept as Immanuel Kant`s "categorical imperatives" can lead to choices that are profoundly destructive. The Jesus-standard of Love, brought to bear on the ethical process, will not permit, however "reasonable" the decision may appear to be, an action which is not coherent with the loving purpose of God.
The use of reason alone, separated from the overriding standard of Love, is the basic constituent of legalism in the worst sense of the word. Unless it is bathed in Love, legalism by its very nature tends to degenerate into a set of impersonal abstractions. It is not difficult to see why legalism has always exercised a seductive appeal for many Christians. We hunger for a "simple" moral system-one that removes all doubt as to the "rightness" of our decisions and relieves us of the responsibility of wrestling with complex and ambiguous situations. But we must realize that this approach is a kind of ethical "cop-out." To surrender the Love-motivated freedom and spontaneity of moral decision-making is to give up an essential element of that which makes us fully human. Consistently applied legalism can reduce us to moral automatons, left only with the minimal ability to say a simple "yes" or "no" to a lifeless, loveless verbalism.
The continuing difficulty of balancing Law and Love-doing the "ethical dance"-has dogged the Christian community from its beginnings. In the formative stages of the New Testament church a crisis arose when the Apostle Paul was led to extend his preaching to the Gentile world. Paul understood the Gospel to be of universal significance, speaking to the basic problems of every human being, whether "Jew or Greek, male or female, slave or free." His vision was crucial for the emergence of Christianity as a truly universal religion. Without that vision the Christian faith seemed destined to be only one among many Jewish sects. The decision of the early church is recorded in the 15th chapter of the Book of Acts. James and the other leaders of the church at Jerusalem had previously insisted that a Gentile who became a Christian must also become a Jew, subject to the ritual of circumcision and the full requirements of the Old Testament law. Paul argued for the Christian faith as a radically new relationship between man and God, based not on ritual or moral legalism, but on loving grace. Paul`s understanding prevailed and, as a result, the Gospel was set free from a legalistic straitjacket.
No sooner, however, had this basic problem been soked. than an opposite corruption of the Gospel arose. Some Christians seized upon their freedom from legalism-the "curs&` of the Law, to posit and practice an alternative "easy" way out of the difficulty of making moral decisions, the heresy of antinomianism. If believers are no longer bound by the Law and if grace is sufficient for the forgiveness of every sin, why should they not disregard entirely the moral admonitions of the Law? If where "sin abounds, grace does much more abound," why should Christians worry about sin at all?
Why should the believer have to struggle with the complex dimensions of moral freedom?
The Apostle Paul saw antinomianism as a problem equally as serious as legalism. He responded by emphasizing the legitimate moral function of Law. The Law, he argued, is primarily valuable to us because it reveals the true dimensions of sin, including wrong moral choice. Aware of those dimensions, the Christian must apply to his or her life the more stringent moral requirements of Love. The believer does not live in an amoral world. Against the indispensable background of the Law-the "beat"-he or she must do the "ethical dance." Paul insisted that there was no easy way to be "good." Goodness arises neither out of robot-like obedience to the letter of the Law nor out of reckless, unprincipled disregard of that Law. Moral decision making is a difficult, even sometimes dangerous, endeavor, arising out of the spirit-led struggle of reasonable, yet fallible, human beings to act in Love. The decisions made will not always be totally right; indeed, all decisions made by sinful humanity will be partial and flawed. This realization imposes on us the virtue of humility and the necessity for open-mindedness. To paraphrase Dietrich Bonhoeffer, the World War II German theologian and martyr, "The Christian must strive, while fully aware of the demands of both Law and Love, to discover and do what appears to be right in any situation. Then, as the believer acts, he or she must pray, `Lord, I am doing what I honestly believe to be right. Forgive me where I am wrong.
For the Christian this is an inescapable responsibility. Seeking to live the God-loving and neighbor-loving life is an essential part of the process of Christian growth-the way in which we progress toward becoming the kind of human beings God purposes us to be. "Therefore, be mature, even as your Father in heaven is mature," Paul counsels us in the Philippian letter. Becoming mature-perfect-is God`s ultimate goal for His creation.
My own judgment-open to legitimate argument-is that there are few honest Christians today who seriously adopt an antinomian position, at least in theory. Obviously, there are many people who live an antinomian life-style without trying to justify it with formal theology. But for many people who sincerely want to be "good," legalism retains its allurement. At this point it is salutary to recall that some of the harshest words of Jesus in the New Testament are reserved, not for blatant sinners like Zaccheus or the woman taken in adultery, but for those staunch defenders of adherence to every jot and tittle of the law, the Pharisees. These zealous law-keepers were Jesus` prime example of self-righteousness. Indeed, there is something endemic in legalism, which pushes individuals toward self-righteousness. Checking off all the instances in which one has obeyed the law is conducive to spiritual pride and an exaggerated estimate of one`s own goodness. It is often the self-righteous legalist who ignores the admonition of Jesus to "judge not, lest ye be judged." The Pharisees exemplified the working out of that admonition. Their proud assumption that they were qualified to serve as moral judges automatically put them on the receiving end of judgment.
In summary, what I have tried to say is that, for a Christian to become what God intends us to be-mature human beings, made in his image-the moral struggle is not an elective but a requirement. If we seek to shun that struggle or to find an "easy" way out of it, we are guilty of moral cowardice. It is often our fear of making the wrong decision or our unwillingness to tackle difficult and complex decisions which paralyzes our capacity to love and blocks our progress toward Christian maturity. We possess the God-given freedom to choose among the available alternatives of action in any ethical situation, but with that freedom comes the responsibility to employ every means at our disposal to make the most loving decision. If we will listen with honesty and humility to the "beat" of the Law while never forgetting the overriding supremacy of Love, I believe we can do the dance of responsible moral freedom. In short, no one can live a Christian ethical life-style without learning this dance.
