Some of the details have escaped me, but I remember the conversation well. I was asked to speak at a conference of counselors in California. I received various invitations that were foreign to the common audiences faced by biblically oriented Christian professionals, but were advanced most often because there was a Christian on a committee that wanted one of us to offer a presentation to their group. It would sometimes fall to me in that the invitation committee discovered that I had a terminal degree from a state university, was the president of an accredited college in San Francisco, had spoken to other conferences so I would be safe to be a presenter to their group – and I had no fee structure except for the meeting of expenses to the conference site and back. (Remuneration was often generous.) I always enjoyed the experience providing opportunity to present a substantive spiritual factor to common secular contexts.
So it was that I made my presentation, offered with a sense of objectivity so that I was well received even if many, sometimes most, disagreed with my theme development. Following this particular hour I was approached by a number of persons with their questions. The one I remember on this occasion was a gentleman, somewhat irritated, who raised a judgmental question: How can you defend the Bible as a source for counseling theory when it is so harsh and bloodthirsty? It says, AN EYE FOR AN EYE AND A TOOTH FOR A TOOTH – RETRIBUTION. (He spoke fiercely, as I am representing him here in capital letters. The conversation is here summarized to accommodate available space.)
I replied: That’s not what it says. He quickly and firmly replied: Yes it does, I have read it myself, and deplore the old approach it makes. I responded: No, you said that it reads: ‘AN EYE FOR AN EYE AND A TOOTH FOR A TOOTH.’ What it says is: ‘An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth.’ (I shifted from stern mien and voice to normal and gentle conversation.) He was a bit heated: What’s the difference? You are contradicting yourself. I focused on objectivity: You are saying: ‘AN EYE FOR AN EYE AND A TOOTH FOR A TOOTH,’ which indeed is vengeful. God is saying: ‘An eye for an eye,’ which is to say, no more than an eye for an eye. The punishment must fit the crime. Mankind, unless checked, will do more than the offense indicates. Kings have ordered death to persons who permitted their shadows to fall on the personage of the king. History is replete with the horror of those in power over others, including parents to children. Moses even makes clear that if a master of a slave causes the loss of an eye to the slave, the master is to free the slave, and the slave is to forgive the offense. The matter is concluded to the advantage of the learning situation, and respect for the social context. Moses had to have law for control of a society. Jesus offered the compassion of God to be found in his people so to teach the greatest solution the world will ever know – forgiveness. He uses it for the shortcut to human solutions. It serves even to the redemption of mankind in the forgiveness of God. With that background a person can be formed to find solutions in society – even to the point of forgiving self. The interpretation you give to the Bible passage is common even among Christians, but not sound. A silence fell on us and those standing around us. He looked down and walked away as did some others.
Biblical Christians live in two citizenships one natural and one spiritual. They learn if they are obedient to the heavenly vision how to be faithful to both contexts, drawing them together in integrated life. Each is seen as it is on its own, and each is seen in the integrated life where both function to the aid of the other in nature, with one yielding to the other in death. To the degree that the Christian yields to the love and compassion of God, to that degree the person is forgiving as God is forgiving. It does, for the sake of justice in perfection, recognize that the penalty has been paid so that the forgiveness has been rightly accounted for, under God. Forgiveness cannot come from a secular context without some penalty paid in fines, in social loss, in incarceration, perhaps in execution. The Christian personally is free to forgive in the spirit of Jesus Christ in God’s forgiveness. That is what Jesus is addressing. It is magnificent beyond our words and culture when grasped and applied. Whatever is wrong in the human condition is assigned to the author of evil. Forgiveness, love and peace are found in spiritual context. *Mark W. Lee, Sr. — 2016, 2020