FAILURE TO HEED THE DISCOURSE OF THE POOR
by Frank Newton, Boiling Springs, North Carolina, USA
Sat. June 12th, 2021
There is a great division among the people in my country on how
the law and the prophets apply to the people who rioted after the killing of
George Floyd. That division will be my
topic.
Introduction
Perhaps very few people nowadays understand the sting which Napoleon
intended when he described the English as "a nation of
shopkeepers." I incline to think
that Napoleon simply meant that "No matter what YOU say, all THEY ever say
is 'Keep your paws off the merchandise'."
Keeping your paws off the merchandise is an important part
of the law. But it is not a good summary
of the law.
It is an important part of the law. Keep your paws off the merchandise is a
corollary of Thou shalt not steal, the commandment which appears in Exodus 20:15
and Deuteronomy 5:19, among the ten commandments: called the seventh commandment
by some Christians, but the eighth commandment by others. From Thou shalt not steal, it follows that
Thou shalt not set fire to the shop and store of any shopkeeper. Also it follows, thou shalt not urinate upon
the merchandise of any shopkeeper, nor permit thy children to toy with the
merchandise, nor do any thing which shall cause the shopkeeper's merchandise to
lose value.
But it is not a good summary of the law (Keep your paws off
the merchandise). The summary of the law
is in Matthew 22:37-40. Jesus is
speaking; replying to a question in verse 36.
In the King James Version:
36
Master, which is the great
commandment? 37 Jesus said unto him, Thou
shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with
all thy mind. 38 This is the first and
great commandment. 39 And the second is like unto it, Thou shalt love thy
neighbor as thyself. 40 On these two commandments
hang all the law and the prophets.
Here we will appeal to the second branch of the summary of
the law: Love your neighbor as yourself.
In another part of the Gospels, Jesus was asked, Who is my neighbor? and
Jesus replied with the parable of the good Samaritan. The burden of that parable is this: your
neighbor is anyone you pass by who is bleeding.
Application of the Law
and the Prophets to the Rioting
The first amendment to the Constitution of the United States
guarantees "the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition
the government for a redress of grievances." But the Constitution and its
amendments do not address the question of what the enforcers of the law should
do, if some of the people assembled are peaceable, but others are not.
A grievance for a long time unredressed is a thorn in the
side of the republic. In other words, a
grievance for a long time unredressed ensures that a portion of those who
assemble to petition will not be peaceable.
Redress seems to mean, literally, to bind up a wound the
second time, when the first binding of the wound did not prevent infection. But sometimes the English language imitates
the French; sometimes the prefix re- in French has lost all semblance of meaning;
therefore, redress might possibly also apply to binding up a wound for the
first time.
Here is the burden of my appeal. The citizen of your nation who assembles peaceably
with others to petition for the redress of grievances is your neighbor. But the citizen of your nation who joins the
same assemblage but riots -- he is no longer peaceable -- is also your neighbor.
In both cases (with your fellow-citizen who assembles
peaceably and your fellow-citizen in the same assemblage who riots) you must
determine if your fellow-citizen is bleeding.
Here is where the sin of failing to heed the discourse of
the poor enters into the picture.
Is failing to heed the discourse of the poor a sin in the
eyes of the Bible and in the eyes of Jesus?
I am not able to answer that question satisfactorily. But I take my cue from Matthew 25:45, which
is the less well-known of Jesus' two conclusions to the parable of God dividing
the sheep from the goats: "Then shall he [the King of Heaven] answer them, saying, Verily I say unto you, Inasmuch as ye
did it not to one of the least of
these, ye did it not to me." (It is less well-known because it includes
the word "not" -- unlike Jesus' first conclusion in verse 40.)
I conclude from that -- If a human being fails to heed the
discourse of the poor, then in the end time, it will be as if that person had
not heeded the discourse of God.
The Discourse of the
Poor
Do you say to me, that the poor have no discourse but to
riot? I would point you to Joel 2:29. What difficult words that verse contains,
after it has been translated into English!
But here it is in the King James Version, with the better-known verse
that precedes it:
28
And it shall come to pass afterwards, that I will pour out my spirit upon all flesh; and your sons and
your daughters shall prophesy, your old men shall dream dreams, your young men
shall see visions: 29 And also upon the servants and upon the
handmaids in those days will I pour out my spirit.
"Upon the servants and upon the handmaids" means
"upon the servants, male and female."
But do not be distracted: this Bible verse does not deserve reproach as
a reference to inequality. It is not a
reference to inequality; it is a reference to equality. Being interpreted by a follower of Jesus, it
means: "In truth, I will pour out my spirit upon the least of your
brothers and sisters." It means,
that the poor will prophesy. It means
that the poor already have prophesied: just as the verse before it means that
the people of more wealth and assets, male and female, will prophesy, and have
already prophesied.
This is to say: the poor have already prophesied, but you
ignored them.
How can this be shown to be true? I tell you: Amos was a herdman. A shepherd, I say. Has anyone heard of a rich shepherd? If not, then Amos was poor.
Amos prophesied in chapter 2, verse 10 "For they know
not to do right, saith the LORD, who store up violence and robbery in their palaces."
Yes indeed, there are two A's in palaces! And the palaces tell you: It is a prophecy
against the rich. Not a prophecy of
prediction: but a prophecy of criticism.
Besides that, is it not written by Paul Simon, that the
words of the prophets are written on the subway walls?
But you ask why is the argument so slender, at this
juncture? Because I have searched on the
internet for "prophets among the poor", and I came up with nothing. Truly, I put quotation marks around it.
Does the failed search for "prophets among the
poor" on the internet mean that there are no prophets among the poor in
the United States of America? It does
not mean so. It means perhaps that no
one has taken the trouble to name the prophets among the poor. Who has searched out the prophets among the
poor? More importantly: who will search
them out?
The merchandise of the shopkeepers was destroyed, because
the people failed to heed the discourse of the poor.
Changing the Way You
Think About Policemen
I tell you, the crusade against child abuse has led in some
cases to parent abuse.
But let me ask you: how do you feel about child abuse? Do you believe that there are a few parents
who are cruel and hateful to their own children? Or do you believe that there are no parents
at all who are cruel and hateful to their own children? Do you believe that there are a few parents
who need to be restrained by their fellow-citizens from hurting their own children?
Now riddle me this: do you believe that there are a few
police officers who are bad apples? In
other words, do you believe that there are a few police officers who are cruel
and hateful to the citizens of their own country? Or do you believe that there are no police
officers at all who are cruel and hateful to the citizens of their own country? Do you believe that there are a few police
officers who need to be restrained by their fellow-citizens from committing
injustices against the citizens of their own country?
The discourse of the poor suggests to me that there are a
few police officers who are cruel and hateful to the citizens of their own
country. I pay attention to the
discourse of the poor. How will those few
police officers be retrained? By
punishment. But how will they be punished?
A prophet is only one citizen. It is not possible for one citizen alone to
determine punishments.
But the thing is just only this: no punishment at all for
bad apples is not appropriate. Although
the discourse of the poor is hard for a single citizen to find on the internet,
it has been written, & it can be found on the internet by a more
thoroughgoing effort than this prophet has made, & it will apply to the
punishment of bad apples, & and it must not be ignored.
Frank Newton
