Full pacifism leaves us vulnerable. When discussing peace, it is easy to assume that all peace is good. There is a suggestion that we should be tolerant of everything. But is is appropriate to be a pacifist when facing spiritual warfare. I cannot be a pacifist when it comes to fighting the enemy’s lies. I usually expand the story of the good Samaritan. The story runs that a man was walking through the hills and was attacked by a group of thugs and left for dead. Two subsequent passers ignored the victim’s plight. A passing Samaritan helped the man. The story is used to highlight the concept of ‘being good to others’. It is implied that helping others will assist in your salvation at your death. However, what is missed is that bad people exist. These bad people may attack you at any time and leave you for dead. I found the following picture quite alarming. Traveling on a lonely road, the victim is attacked and killed by a team of Thuggees for his minor assets.
This picture makes me feel quite vulnerable as I often travel alone in lonely streets around the world.
On a program about Africa, I remember a man saying he didn’t like somebody so he killed him. We assume that, if somebody robs us, they will take out wallet and leave us intact. It is not appropriate to think this. A robber may steal your tv and rape your daughters whilst present.
We have and expectation that a robber will simply take our wallet and leave without harming us. Although the robber is a robber, we assume he has respect for human life. This is not universal and it never was universal. It is certainly not universal in the animal kingdom. Even humans shoot animals for sport or kill them for food without moral dilemma. Before we became civilized, we had no rules. There were no rules against theft, rape, or murder. If I did not like you, I killed you. We operated closer to the way that all animals treat each other. Gangs still operate to this lower level of rules whilst having a code honour between fellow criminals. The above picture is similar to the story of the good Samaritan. The Thuggees have no respect for the rights or the life of the victim. Similar still occurs with sex trafficking and in those non-Christian countries that still practice slavery. Even the random killing of Christians by those of unfriendly religions is if the same thinking.
We should not be tolerant of those that perpetrate evil. Here is a paragraph about sex slavery into Israel.
Israel Hebrew website says that the total annual profits garnered from white slavery in Israel have reached the US $1 Billion Dollar mark. (2005)
10,000 Eastern European and Russian girls are lured to Israel each year and enslaved as prostitutes. [2]
This link will give you some unpleasant reading:
https://yandex.com/search/?text=modern+slavery+into+israel&lr=10449
Even ‘The Times of Israel’ headlines: “Thousands of slaves in Israel, global study finds.“[1][3]
As Christians, we cannot assume that people are of the same kind mind as ourselves. Jesus constantly talked of bad people.
You brood of vipers, how can you, being evil, speak what is good? [5]
The bible is full of instances where he criticizes bad people. Here, he implies they will not go to heaven:
…but he who denies Me before men will be denied before the angels of God.
Luke 12:9
But when he saw many of the Pharisees and Sadducees coming for baptism, he said to them, “You brood of vipers, who warned you to flee from the wrath to come?”
Matthew 3:7-8
Here, he admits that bad people exist:
Be not envious of evil men, nor desire to be with them, for their hearts devise violence, and their lips talk of trouble.
Proverbs 24:1-34
When one has a discussion about peace, there is an assumption that all peace is good. But should be have peace with the devil? Should we have peace with evil people. Should we have peace with the robber holding a gun. No. We should actively stand against these people as Jesus did.
Woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! for ye are like unto whited sepulchres, which indeed appear beautiful outward, but are within full of dead ..
Matthew 23:27 KJV
We should be tolerant of intolerance. Don’t deal with tricksters — they will get you in the end!
The paradox of tolerance states that if a society is tolerant without limit, its ability to be tolerant is eventually seized or destroyed by the intolerant. Karl Popper described it as the seemingly self-contradictory idea that in order to maintain a tolerant society, the society must retain the right to be intolerant of intolerance.
Somewhat like freedom. Total freedom is the freedom to be bashed. To be free, we need limitations on what others can do to us. Before civilisation, we were free in the most complete form of the concept, but we were not safe. To be free in our concept of the concept of freedom, there must be limitations on the behaviours of others.
“The so-called paradox of freedom is the argument that freedom in the sense of absence of any constraining control must lead to very great restraint, since it makes the bully free to enslave the meek. The idea is, in a slightly different form, and with very different tendency, clearly expressed in Plato.” – Karl Popper [4] ~1945
Popper continues:
Less well known is the paradox of tolerance: Unlimited tolerance must lead to the disappearance of tolerance. If we extend unlimited tolerance even to those who are intolerant, if we are not prepared to defend a tolerant society against the onslaught of the intolerant, then the tolerant will be destroyed, and tolerance with them.
Karl Popper [4] ~1945
And more from Popper:
But we should claim the right to suppress them if necessary even by force; for it may easily turn out that they are not prepared to meet us on the level of rational argument, but begin by denouncing all argument; they may forbid their followers, because it is deceptive, and teach them to answer arguments by the use of their fists or pistols. We should therefore claim, in the name of tolerance, the right not to tolerate the intolerant. We should claim that any movement preaching intolerance places itself outside the law, and we should consider incitement to intolerance and persecution as criminal, in the same way as we should consider incitement to murder, or to kidnapping, or to the revival of the slave trade, as criminal.”
Karl Popper [4] ~1945
You may have spotted Karl referring to an unwillingness ‘to listen to rational argument’. This is an important recognition. Sources can use irrational reasoning against us and we shut up and don’t reply. I have been told that men are toxic. But I am not toxic. The person telling me appears toxic to me. But I can’t win an argument on the accusation. To argue back make me sound toxic! We were taught (indoctrinated) in schools to use ‘rational argument’ when negotiating with others. We become rapidly frustrated when dealing with someone that will not listen to reason. We have no defense against those that are illogical. Yet, we expect people to be tolerant of our views, or at least tolerant enough to consider them. The bible is full of expectation that a person should think about their actions. We have no practice at handling situations where reason does not play a role. We are currently suffering under a lack of rational argument. If I criticize Islam, I am Islamaphobic even if I speak the truth. If I explain something, I am mansplaining. If I point out Jewish wrongs, I am anti-Semitic, even though Semitic peoples are of the Midlle East and most calling themselves Jewish have no Semitic DNA. Kindly note that Palestinians that are fully Semitic. If I point out truthful crime statistics, I am racist. Truth is irrelevant.
We have come to believe that tolerance is a virtue that everyone should practice tolerance. However, tolerance is deadly if it’s take to the limit. Should I tolerate those who want to transform our society as I know it. I remember my mother saying: “It all started to go wrong when you boys were teenagers.” That would be the late sixties. Music took a turn. Girls were encouraged to take hormone pills. Sex was no longer tied to a promise of marriage. Rod Stuart sang: “Spread your wings and let me come inside.” The 1960s were a period when long‐held values changed. The young talked of sex, drugs, and ‘rock and roll’. Persons deviated from following the ways of their parents. Norms of behavior seemed to break down, primarily among the young. What was called a ‘sexual revolution’ continued through to start of the AIDS crisis in the mid‐’80s. Birth rates declined and the number of abortions, unwed mothers, and divorces rose. Families started to fall apart. Female happiness is at an all time low.
The majority of Canadians believe in tolerance. The unanswered question is “Do the immigrants believe in tolerance?”
To destroy Christianity is difficult. I say the real Christianity is what our mothers teach us when we are under the age of about seven. In effect, our mother bring us up using Jesus as a role model. Even if the word Jesus is never mentioned, the characteristics and moral code that our mother teach us, reinforced by our fathers is essentially the characteristics of Jesus. So Christianity functions even if the Church goes off the rails and even if Jesus is a Father Christmas type virtual character. I have learned that happiness does not come from doing self indulgent things, such as racing my motorcycles. Happiness comes from making others happy. That does not mean that I am condescending to them. Sometimes it means that you give them a kick in the backside.
Let us look at a plan to destroy Christianity. It was written by Alice Bailey (1880 to 1949). Many years ago, she made a ten point plan to destroy Christianity. Here are her points:
- Take god and prayer out of the education system.
- Reduce parental authority over the children.
- Destroy the judeo-christian family structure or the traditional christian family structure.
- If sex is free, then make abortion legal and make it easy.
- Make divorce easy and legal, free people from the concept of marriage for life.
- Make homosexuality an alternative lifestyle.
- Debase art, make it run mad.
- Use media to promote and change mindsets.
- Create an interfaith movement.
- Get governments to make all these law and get the church to endorse these changes.
Knowing what the enemy is trying to do gives us some chance of preventing their success. It is these items here above that we should resist. We should be intolerant of the above ten items.
[1] https://www.timesofisrael.com/thousands-of-slaves-in-israel-global-study-finds/[2] https://justice4poland.com/2016/07/21/world-wide-white-slave-trade-centred-in-israel/
[3] I choose Yandex because it not censored by those that wish to hide their crimes.[4] Karl Raimund Popper, The Open Society and Its Enemies. 1945
[5] Matthew 12
