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Social Justice in the Bible


David Bokovoy

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David,

There's an interesting Ensign article called "The Book that Built a Better World" which aligns nicely with some of the thoughts expressed in this thread. Hope you don't mind me posting some excerpts and the link for anyone interested.

The morality of
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David,

There's an interesting Ensign article called "The Book that Built a Better World" which aligns nicely with some of the thoughts expressed in this thread. Hope you don't mind me posting some excerpts and the link for anyone interested.

~ January 1998 Ensign

I always love to read what you have to offer and have learned quite a bit from you over the years. I especially appreciate your ability to link discussion topics to Church publications. This one is a real gem! Nice to see that the Church has not "dropped" the important concept of social justice:

"Whereas other religions of the period never

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I always love to read what you have to offer and have learned quite a bit from you over the years. I especially appreciate your ability to link discussion topics to Church publications. This one is a real gem! Nice to see that the Church has not "dropped" the important concept of social justice:

"Whereas other religions of the period never

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Did you read Grant Hardy's article in Meridian Magazine today?

The Book of Mormon and Social Justice

Let me guess: you went to the Church's website, and searched for "social justice," and discovered that article. I tried the same, and found a few more. I found four articles that mention "social justice" on the Church's website, including the one you had referenced. Of the remaining three, one of them mentions it purely in a historical setting, without positing an opinion on the concept. That leaves two articles that will be of interest to us. One is by President James E. Faust and the other by by Elder D. Todd Christofferson; both of whom appear distinctly unenthusiastic about the use of the term:

I wonder how much we offend Satan if the proclamation of our faith is limited only to the great humanitarian work this church does throughout the world, marvelous as these activities are. When we preach the gospel of
social justice,
no doubt the devil is not troubled. But I believe the devil is terribly offended when we boldly declare by personal testimony that Joseph Smith was a prophet of God and that he saw the Father and the Son; when we preach that the Book of Mormon is another witness for Christ; when we declare that there has been a restoration of the fulness of the gospel in its simplicity and power in order to fulfill the great plan of happiness. (James E. Faust, "Serving the Lord and Resisting the Devil",
Ensign,
September 1995, 2)

In a complete reversal from a century ago, many today would dispute with Alma about the seriousness of immorality. Others would argue that it
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Let me guess: you went to the Church's website, and searched for "social justice," and discovered that article. I tried the same, and found a few more. I found four articles that mention "social justice" on the Church's website, including the one you had referenced. Of the remaining three, one of them mentions it purely in a historical setting, without positing an opinion on the concept. That leaves two articles that will be of interest to us. One is by President James E. Faust and the other by by Elder D. Todd Christofferson; both of whom appear distinctly unenthusiastic about the use of the term:

Actually, I didn't. I was reading another discussion of Hardy's article and someone else did. ;)

I wonder how much we offend Satan if the proclamation of our faith is limited only to the great humanitarian work this church does throughout the world, marvelous as these activities are. When we preach the gospel of social justice, no doubt the devil is not troubled. But I believe the devil is terribly offended when we boldly declare by personal testimony that Joseph Smith was a prophet of God and that he saw the Father and the Son; when we preach that the Book of Mormon is another witness for Christ; when we declare that there has been a restoration of the fulness of the gospel in its simplicity and power in order to fulfill the great plan of happiness. (James E. Faust, "Serving the Lord and Resisting the Devil", Ensign, September 1995, 2)

Notice that President Faust says we preach social justice. And I agree that the devil isn't troubled. That's because he can counterfeit scriptural social responsibility and justice with man-made philosophies - he already has.

In a complete reversal from a century ago, many today would dispute with Alma about the seriousness of immorality. Others would argue that it
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Let me guess: you went to the Church's website, and searched for "social justice," and discovered that article. I tried the same, and found a few more. I found four articles that mention "social justice" on the Church's website, including the one you had referenced. Of the remaining three, one of them mentions it purely in a historical setting, without positing an opinion on the concept. That leaves two articles that will be of interest to us. One is by President James E. Faust and the other by by Elder D. Todd Christofferson; both of whom appear distinctly unenthusiastic about the use of the term:

I wonder how much we offend Satan if the proclamation of our faith is limited only to the great humanitarian work this church does throughout the world, marvelous as these activities are. When we preach the gospel of
social justice,
no doubt the devil is not troubled. But I believe the devil is terribly offended when we boldly declare by personal testimony that Joseph Smith was a prophet of God and that he saw the Father and the Son; when we preach that the Book of Mormon is another witness for Christ; when we declare that there has been a restoration of the fulness of the gospel in its simplicity and power in order to fulfill the great plan of happiness. (James E. Faust, "Serving the Lord and Resisting the Devil",
Ensign,
September 1995, 2)

In a complete reversal from a century ago, many today would dispute with Alma about the seriousness of immorality. Others would argue that it
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Excellent! So we have one official Church publication that states that the OT produced a major social revolution fired by a high concept of "social justice." An apostle stating that we preach the gospel of social justice, coupled with a testimony of Joseph Smith as prophet and the Book of Mormon as another witness for Christ, and another declaring that social justice without demands upon our personal life and behavior is problematic.

And some of you want us to stop using the term?!!! Perhaps you should start writing letters of complaint to the Brethren.

Say what you like, neither of them sound enthusiastic about the use of the term.

And do you know how many thousands of articles are stored in the Church's website? The fact that only four articles could be found in which the term is used is telling.

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Say what you like, neither of them sound enthusiastic about the use of the term.

You honestly believe that an Apostle who served in the House of Representatives for the 28th Utah State Legislature as a Democrat for Utah's eighth district and as chairperson of the Utah State Democratic Party found the term "social justice" problematic when he says we preach it!

Trust me, say what you want, but if the apostles disagreeded with the term "social justice," there is no way the expression would appear in an Ensign article stating that the OT produced a major social revolution fired by a high concept of "social justice."

Weren't you the one who stated that the concept of "social justice" does not appear in the scriptures?! Clearly your opinion is at odds with the Brethren.

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You honestly believe that an Apostle who served in the House of Representatives for the 28th Utah State Legislature as a Democrat for Utah's eighth district and as chairperson of the Utah State Democratic Party found the term "social justice" problematic when he says we preach it!

Trust me, say what you want, but if the apostles disagreeded with the term "social justice," there is no way the expression would appear in an Ensign article stating that the OT produced a major social revolution fired by a high concept of "social justice."

Weren't you the one who stated that the concept of "social justice" does not appear in the scriptures?! Clearly your opinion is at odds with the Brethren.

Just edited that post. Try again.

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Honestly, you make a comment like this and then have the brass to tell me that despite the fact that I hold an MA and PhD in Hebrew Bible from one of the world's most prestigious programs in the field that I do not understand the biblical Jubilee.

I'll cite Nibley who cites Deuteronomy 15:9:

"But one may not refuse a loan because the Lord's release is near, in which whatever you lent will not have to be paid back: 'Beware that there be a thought in thy wicked heart, saying, The Seventh year, the year of release, is at hand; and thine eye be evil against thy poor brother [the calm, appraising stare], and thou givest him nought and he cry unto the Lord against thee, and it be a sin unto thee" (Deuteornomy 15:9). This is an example of the meanness of spirt that offends God more than anything else." in Approaching Zion, 218.

Your notion that one could refuse to give a loan if the Jubilee was near is defined as possessing a "wicked heart" and a violation of God's command.

I'm not posting these things to upset you, DB, and this certainly isn't personal.

I actually took the "thou givest him nought" into consideration with my appraisal of the economic realities. When the "Seventh year, the year of release is at hand," and a debtor borrows beyond his needs, without reasonable expectation of repaying, he is committing an immoral act. It's like the debtor before the bankruptcy laws changed in the US, who'd run up credit card bills without ever intending to repay, then get them discharged in bankruptcy. I cannot envision a moral system under which such a thing is okay. This is on the debtor's side.

On the other hand, I took the "thou givest him nought" into consideration when considering the moral duty of the creditor. If repayment is not practicable under the circumstances, then giving the debtor the debtor's needs, not wants, sufficient to keep him and his from starvation/want fulfills the moral duty in Deuteronomy.

Funny thing about ivory tower Nibley, he never had to feed a family from the proceeds of investments -- he had a teaching job which gave him the leisure to think lofty thoughts untroubled with making a payroll or make sure the 941s were filed and the quarterly/monthly tax deposits timely made. It changes ones perspectives.

Fact is, debtors qua debtors are no more virtuous than creditors qua creditors. As the old federal judge in Utah used to say, "We leave our ethical fingerprints on everything we touch."

That's correct only for the period of Consecration affected by the Bates' lawsuit, i.e. 1833. The Law was based upon the revealed system in which "the grantor bound himself and his heirs to release forever all rights to and interests in certain scheduled property." Lyndon W. Cook, Joseph Smith and the Law of Consecration, 16. I've seen copies of the consecration deeds myself in the Church History museum. Here is a copy of the Levi Jackman deed featured on pages 28-29 of the book Building the City of God:

"Be it known that I, Levi Jackman of the church of Christ... do of my own free will and accord having first paid my just debts, grant and hereby give unto Edward Partridge of Jackson county, and state of Missouri, bishop of said church the following described property, viz sundry articles of furniture valued thrity seven dollars, also two beds, bedding and feathers valued forty four dollars fifty cents, also three acres and other tools valued eleven dollars and twenty five cents.

"For the purpose of purchaing lands and building up the New Jerusalem, even Zion, and for reliving the wants of the poor and needy. For which I the said Levi Jackman do covenant and bind myself and my heirs forever, to release all my right to the above described property, unto him, the said Edward Partridge."

And yet in all of these threads, for a couple of years now, we have had nothing but page after page of assertions such as this coupled with endless writings on modern political rhetoric. Yet no one has been able to counter any of these views via scriptural and/or historical analysis. Honestly, look at yours, Vance's, BC's, Droopy's, Will's, et al.'s contributions and try and uncover a single example of scriptural evidence and/or analysis offered in support of your opposition.

Do you ever stop and wonder why this is the case?

Well, the Brigham City experiment, with which I'm most familiar (besides the folks down in Short Creek prior to their incorporation, but that's another story for another day), and they had the Bishop's scrip given back to the donor under the deed of gift clear up until they disincorporated the Bishop-run coops (or transferred them to shareholders) and broke up everything and handed it back to the donors (or their heirs), retaining only the Church farms. It wasn't all long ago (my great-grandfather's day), and memories run long in such places and such families.

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Where you have the right to vote, there is no theft.

If I voted for the guys who decide to take my stuff, then there is a minor difference, but as I never vote for anyone who will raise taxes, then it is theft.

By your line of reasoning, do you agree that war = murder

Sometimes war is murder. I believe Ho Chi Min was a warrior murderer. He is far from alone.

I also believe that conscription is murder, too. Volunteers are risking their own lives by choice.

For the perpetrator of a war, the political perpetrator, war is always murder.

incarceration = kidnapping?

Sometimes incarceration is kidnapping. Political prisoners are kidnappees. Most drug "offenders" are kidnappees.

In any case, there is no justification for incarceration. If there is a true crime committed, the perpetrator should compensate his victim (for the loss, including administration costs, etc.) and the matter settled. But enter government, and not only is the victim not made whole, the victim is further victimized by having to pay taxes to support the criminal with a place to live, free food, and uninterrupted leisure.

Or is your b&w thinking only applied toward taxes?

Oh, nice touch. My "b&w thinking" is far more nuanced than you seem to be capable of grasping.

Lehi

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As illustrated by the citation of Isaiah 6, the responsibility to be clean and pure according to biblical conceptions was both an individual and a communal issue. Contrary to what a few others in this thread have suggested, communal salvation and sin is an extremely important religious concept in the Bible, especially in the context of the Priestly view of impurity.

For example, Leviticus 4:3-21 deals specifically with sins that have brought guilt upon the collective community. Note that the sin offerings discussed in this section provide atonement for

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Then please explain why Natan Sharansky's party had no problem with the term, or why every political party in Israel regardless of left or right uses it, or why the Likkud and Begin won the elections under that banner. It is a neutral term.

That is because it has now become a politically acceptable term. It is associated with government based social welfare programs that is now part of most governments in industrialized countries including Israel, and the majority of the populations don't want to give that up. (And I am not advocating that all government based social welfare programs should be abandoned either; society as a whole does have a responsibility to take care of the individual citizen who is in need.) So even right wing governments (in Europe and Israel especially) have to advocate that line, or at least pretend to, otherwise they won't get elected. Nevertheless, it is true that socialists everywhere use the term "social justice" with a hidden agenda to promote the socialist ideology. The term "social justice" could be defined in ways that it does not promote the socialist ideology. The trouble is that historically it has been used in that way, therefore those concepts have inevitably become associated with it, whether one likes it or not.

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YUP!

Democracy is two wolves and a sheep voting on what's for dinner.

LDS Article of Faith #12, "We believe in being subject to kings, presidents, rulers, and magistrates, in obeying, honoring, and sustaining the law."

The Mormon people have long had an enviable reputation for obeying the law of whatever gov't they live under. In East Germany at a time when the Iron Curtain had not yet come down, that meant that Mormons could be trusted not to create problems for the Communist gov't. It meant that property could be acquired and an LDS Temple could be built then in East Germany. Eventually their patience and faith was rewarded by the freedom to live in a true democracy.

However, some on this board apparently equate democracy in America with totalitarian dictatorship of the proletariat, and I have met a number of erstwhile Mormon guests of our U. S. Federal Bureau of Prisons who thought that they were not obligated under U.S. law to pay income taxes or to obey other parts of the U. S. Code. They were not interested in the fact that their elected representatives had created that Code. Few of them had read or understood the Constitution of the United States, nor did they consider it part of a social contract which holds this nation together. Apparently they did not understand the nature of civil society, the demands which it makes on our time and fortunes, and the demand on our very lives in its defense -- if need be. Apparently their pledge of allegiance each morning in public school was all form and no substance for them.

Are there inequities in democracies? Of course there are, which means that some conniving groups and individuals will seek to enrich themselves at someone else's expense: Many of us are still smarting over the perverse image of denizens of Wall Street walking away with millions of dollars each in bonuses courtesy of the U. S. middle-class taxpayer. The brokers paid plenty to the best men that money can buy in Congress to enact laws enabling their legal theft -- some people call it "corporate welfare," and even the U. S. Supreme Court considers corporations to be persons with political rights. I'm waiting with baited breath for the day when that same high Court votes to approve the same rights for the robots which will replace us all . . . Just kidding rolleyes.gif

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That is because it has now become a politically acceptable term. It is associated with government based social welfare programs that is now part of most governments in industrialized countries including Israel, and the majority of the populations don't want to give that up. (And I am not advocating that all government based social welfare programs should be abandoned either; society as a whole does have a responsibility to take care of the individual citizen who is in need.) So even right wing governments (in Europe and Israel especially) have to advocate that line, or at least pretend to, otherwise they won't get elected. Nevertheless, it is true that socialists everywhere use the term "social justice" with a hidden agenda to promote the socialist ideology. The term "social justice" could be defined in ways that it does not promote the socialist ideology. The trouble is that historically it has been used in that way, therefore those concepts have inevitably become associated with it, whether one likes it or not.

No, you hold that social justice overseas is code for socialism. Social justice is espoused even by parties who find socialism repugnant. Everyone wants a just and equitable society, the means of acheiving one is where differences lie. Most plans in Israel under the banner of social justice have nothing to do with forced redistirbution of wealth, but with increasing educational and employment opportunities in poverty-stricken areas such as the Negev. As Walker said, the term doesn't cause a knee-jerk reaction.

If we look at how justice is expressed in the Bible, the use of the adjective social is justified. Take for instance Hosea 2, where justice is part of a kin-based society, or any number of the psalms.

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Social Justice is a word that is merely a tool for those in power. It no longer has a real meaning. If you have a cause, you paint "social justice" on it. I have seen it used by the Sendero Luminoso in Peru, the Nicaraguan Sandinistas, the Contras of El Salvador, Pinochet in Chile, Bill Clinton and Obama in the US, and Bush in Brazil.

So yes, when I see the term social justice, there is a certain twitch in the knee and a roll of the eyes, and a "not again" in the head. The term has been so often used to push forward some agenda or another, it has lost its flavor of meaning, like religion in Europe or "gay" meaning happy.

Ye are the salt of the earth: but if the salt have lost his savour, wherewith shall it be salted? it is thenceforth good for nothing, but to be cast out, and to be trodden under foot of men.
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As mentioned, the Bible calls for a cyclical overhaul of the economy via the Year of Jubilee (Lev. 25-26). In the year of Jubilee, there was a complete release of all debts, a Sabbath rest for land and people, and redistribution of lands lost by the poor due to debt. This system was designed to eradicate long term poverty and establish social justice. Was eradicating the debt owed to a lender "theft"?

Some say that God condemned Judah to 70 years exile due to their failure to observe the Jubilee through seventy cycles. How could he send his chosen people into exile? Why would he hold an entire community guilty if such crimes are individual? Clearly some had not disobeyed the Lord. Yet they too had to suffer.

I am reminded of the Jewish story (a parable really) about a boat with several passengers. One passenger begins trying to cut a hole in the bottom of the boat. The others act quickly to stop him, reasoning that as a group all are likely to drown if the one individual is not forcefully stopped. A fortiori (kal vehomer) for a covenant community which might have its existence threatened by outlandish behavior of some individual or group of individuals.

I saw the film "Exodus" again recently (the one starring Paul Newman and Sal Mineo) and reflected on the scene in which a representative of the mainstream Jewish Hagana tried to reason with leaders of the Jewish terrorist Irgun that their actions might very well prevent the United Nations from declaring a Jewish State. Naturally the Irgun ignored that plea and went ahead and bombed the King David Hotel in Jerusalem (the residence of the British High Commissioner for Palestine and many of his top staff). The film not only depicts that historical fact, but also demonstrates the admirable discipline of the Palmach and even of Jewish children when war was declared on the new Jewish State, and five Arab armies sought to destroy them immediately.

What needs to be emphasized here is the covenant community (rather than the non-biblical and non-Mormon atomistic concept promulgated by Loran Blood) which we see formally entered into and formally renewed in both Bible and Book of Mormon -- from the solemn oath and covenant entered into by the people of Benjamin & Mosiah II (Mosiah 5:2-5) through the biblical period, and into modern times with the solemn covenants repeatedly entered into by us in the House of the Lord.

The late David Noel Freedman said:

"While the commandments are addressed to the individual and require individual compliance, it is the community which is answerable to God for the actions of its members. . . . The community is the legally constituted agency of his judgment. Thus, each citizen has a dual responsibility under the terms of the covenant: to observe the stipulations as they apply to him personally and to his family and to participate in the orderly administration of justice and equity, thus sharing in the community's responsibility before God." (Freedman, "Divine Commitment and Human Obligation: The Covenant Theme," in Freedman,
Divine Commitment and Human Obligation: Selected Writings of David Noel Freedman
, 2 vols. [Eerdmans, 1997], I:175)

Freedman continued:

" . . . in the face of this all but total destruction, hope persisted. It was rooted in the conviction that God was still committed to Israel, and that the bond between them would one day be renewed. These things would happen not because of some change in Israel which would merit divine favor; rather, God's act of grace in renewing and restoring his people would produce a new Israel worthy of the land to which they had been restored." (Freedman, I:177)

See also the paper delivered at BYU in March 1985 by George E. Mendenhall, "

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If democracy was not practiced in the Old Testament, would that be an indication that democracy should not be held in any positive esteem today?

Would the economic system of the Old Testament have provided for the increased well being of the world today (ie longer life cycles, more productive life cycles and so on).

Is the communal responsibility a reflection of the economic system in place at the time, or was it universal to all economic systems? We apply the Old Testament to singular points but do not embrace its entire rule base. How would we, for example interpret Christ's dictum regarding the emphasis of individual responsibility over social responsibility?

Do we go tribal, as much of the history of the early Israelites was, and then assume social responsibility? Where then is the personal choice aspect? Especially when exile meant death?

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