How Romulus Might Solve Some of the Problems of West European and American Society

Many American and West European cities have major problems.  Crime and violence are only two of the problems. There is a general breakdown of social values that result in the breakdown of law and order.  Some cities are addressing the issues better than others, but the public dialogue about the problems seems unserious.  Not only cities but society at large faces many, many problems, and the future looks very grim.  Some ‘out-of-the-box’ thinking is needed.  This essay offers just that.  It is a 'thought experiment', with lessons taken from Romulus’s concerns and solutions when he established Roman society.

Living at the end of the 1st century BC, Roman historian Dionysius of Hallicarnassus provided a summary of the accomplishments of Rome’s founder.  Once the people accepted Romulus as their monarch in the 8th c. BC, he organised the population, established laws, and expanded the kingdom through conquest and colonization.  Romulus at the very least offers a comparison to the failed governance in our times, even if many things are not realistic options for the present context.

First, Romulus organised society in two key ways.  Following Athenian and Thessalian models, he distinguished two classes of men.  The well-born were distinguished by their birth, virtue, and wealth, and those initially chosen also had to have established families (Roman Antiquities 8).  While Rome and Greek city states embraced a two class system to the extent that one group ruled while the other served, Romulus turned the relationship between the two classes from one of disparagement and resentment to one of patrician and client. 

All this seems so far from anything we might consider in Western cities, but several points should be considered.  First, the issue should not be whether society should be considered in terms of class but whether society is arranged in such a way that people from the lower class might have access to the upper class rather than shut out from it.  Romulus even notes that, over time, the hard distinctions between the two classes eventually broke down to a degree.  A problem we face in Western cities is that we assume equality when there is not, or, now, we assume that the right approach to ‘equity’—the equalizing of society—should undermine the ruling class and treat the lower class as victims who deserve reparations for their being victimized in past and present generations.  Instead of promoting social improvement, the result is restructuring society through social entitlement.  If entitlement was wrong for the upper class, it should also be clear that it is wrong for the lower class.  Social mobility according to merit not only promotes a certain degree of equality but also excellence.

Second, Romulus organised society as follows.  The largest grouping was that of tribes, overseen by tribunes, the next groups within these were called curiae, overseen by ‘curiones’.  Each curia was divided into ten parts, overseen by a ‘decurio’. 

This is largely a plan related to the land and its occupants rather than any city organisation.  Yet some more sensible division of society would make a remarkable difference in today’s cities.  Why would a town have a mayor and a city have a mayor when the differences can be measured in numbers from a few hundred to millions?  Imagine a city with smaller districts, even organised by neighbourhoods.  Romulus’s plan worked when the smaller social unit could operate in a more familial-business model of patricians (fathers) and clients (business).  Knowing the individuals that one oversees is essential for good governance.  This matter applies to policing, school sizes, housing, development, local government, the rejection of a large union for education, and so forth.  Cities would be greatly improved if smaller units were created with a familial-business relationship to introduce order, productivity, and beneficence.

The Roman social organization of patrician and clients provided an amicable and advantageous relationship between those with oversight and class advantage and the rest.  The problem with the Greek social arrangement was that the lower class resented the oppressive upper, ruling class.  The lawlessness of certain American cities operates in part out of a failure of policing (due to politics) and a sense of entitlement for those imagining themselves to be victims.  Romulus’ solution was to create more of a parental model, with the understanding of ‘parent’ (father) as one holding more authority than a master did over a slave.  Western cultures have largely broken down because they have undermined not only the family but also the role of a father in both the family and society.  Black society in America has the shocking statistic that 68% of children are raised in single parent households, most of which lack a father figure.  Options need to be introduced to improve family cohesiveness and responsibility.  Where families have broken apart, a parental model is still needed in the system.  The opposite of this is angry youth raging through the streets, pillaging shops and burning buildings because they feel victimized and entitled.

Dionysius offered some observations about good governance in the cities under the founder of Rome, Romulus.  He outlines these as (Roman Antiquities 18):

1.     Establishing favour among the citizenry for the gods (religious observance)
2.     Promoting temperance or moderation and justice.  This came through the laws that Romulus established.  He established laws that encouraged every citizen to be just and temperate in their own lives.  Dionysius describes these in some detail under the following topics: sexuality and marriage (24-25), fathers and children (26-27), and slaves (28).  He adds that Romulus administered swift justice (29).
3.     Making honour rather than shameful pleasures the measure of happiness.
4.     Rewarding bravery in war.  Dionysius then adds that other virtues would follow after the promotion in society of this virtue.

Could Romulus's suggestions solve some of the issues infecting American cities?  I would suggest that they could.  Christian religion is under attack in several Western societies, but Romulus advocates the promotion of religion.  This will not happen in America, of course, given the First Amendment.  However, what if society set aside the hours of Sunday morning for worship, not holding children’s sports programmes at that time?  What if children were given school vouchers that allowed them to study at Christian schools (or other private schools promoting good values)?  What the United States has right now is an increasing antagonism toward Christianity (not toward all religions).  The purpose of Christianity is not to promote good values in society—there is far more to Christian faith than this.  However, Christian values are good for society.

Romulus’s just laws in society focus on the family, which in antiquity was discussed in terms of marriage, parenting, and the master-slave relationship.  The new society advocated by a large sector of American society is anti-family.  Every form of sexual perversion hides behind the mask of freedom.  Adults promote sexual deviancy enacted before children, perform medical experiments on their bodies in the name of gender diversity, and wrestle them away from parental oversight.  A sexually lax society promotes sex as pleasure, turns marriage into partnerships, imagines that marriage can be between people of the same sex, offers no-fault divorce, and thinks nothing of adultery.  Society’s breakdown is always manifested most sadly in what it does to its children, who pay so dearly for the disparagement of marriage.

Romulus would also have us promote honour in society, and that over against shameful pleasures.  Hollywood knows how to produce movies about military honour, but Romulus probably reserved his thoughts about the military for the virtue of bravery or courage.  By honour is meant so much more.  Movies tend to be about romance and, if not on the Hallmark channel, romance understood as sexual passion.  Detective shows and murder mysteries abound, since people like to follow a story about who the criminal was and how he or she is discovered.  But where are the movies (not to mention videos and social media) that promote a society of honour, dignity, resolve, honesty, and so forth?  Entertainment is time and again a menu of violence and sex, a stoking of the baser passions that produce a society of violence and sex. 

We might beg to differ from Romulus about the chief social value being military bravery, but we see in his suggestions that social virtues must be promoted.  Here we need to note that this discussion requires a commitment to a certain vision of the good society.  The good society was something America’s founding fathers might have been in a position to discuss and, to a large degree, agree upon.  Today is quite different.  The most the Christian might hope for and pray for is what Paul offers in 1 Timothy 2.1-7: pray for the leaders of society so that they will allow Christians to live a quiet, godly, and dignified life in every way and so live that they can witness their good life to the larger society.  The Christian faith is one open to all as God ‘desires all to be saved and come to a knowledge of the truth' (v. 4).  The Church’s values are not universal values but values held because of the faith we profess.  We ask the larger society to allow us to live as God has called us to live.  We ask mainline denominations to stop living the way the larger society lives but to convert back to the Christian faith.  We ask those of other faiths to discern who is a true believer and who is a false believer that they might know the Biblical and historic values of Christianity.  We ask all to investigate the true, Christian life.

Romulus, of course, was anything but a Christian.  He is hardly the one to solve all the problems of the modern city.  He is, however—and in my estimation if no one else’s—far wiser than so many of our own politicians and government officials and city governments.  His advice can be promoted to some degree by Christians as providing good solutions for some of the problems plaguing our cities.

Finally, Romulus introduced a different concept of citizenship from Greece.  Instead of conquering enemy cities and then putting the military age men to death and enslaving the rest of populations, he colonized the cities.  Sending Romans to inhabit the reestablished cities was a far better plan than simply destroying them.  Moreover, some in these cities were granted Roman citizenship, whereas the Greeks guarded citizenship far more strictly.

A current problem in Western cities has to do with citizenship.  People from other nations pouring across the borders of America and Europe would have been met with battle by Romulus.  Rome became an empire because it did not allow itself to be overrun but took control of expansion.  Probably, if Romulus were to address the ‘root causes’ of a southern border crisis in the USA, he would not simply build a wall and enforce visa and immigration laws.  He would probably also conquer the nations whose populations stream across the border and then send American citizens to colonise those countries.  Thereby, he would establish just societies that are beneficial rather than a threat to America. 

Countries need more than borders and a respect for citizenship, both of which are lacking sufficient respect in countries of Western Europe (contrast Hungary and Poland) and America.  They also need to engage in mutually beneficial ways with those ‘tribes’ outside their borders.  The solution to the border crisis is subsidiary to foreign policy, and the West has a very poor historical record with its foreign policy. 

Romulus—the Romans—understood this.  Their imperialism is hardly a model to follow, but it was presented as a promotion of ‘peace’ wherever they extended their rule.  Self-interest was certainly a primary concern, as it is for today’s Chinese imperialism and American imperialism.  For various reasons, many countries are convinced that China’s self-interests will benefit them rather than enslave them.  One probable reason might be that China cares so little for the societies that it increasingly dominates through economic exploitation that the nations think they have retained their autonomy and self-respect.  Over against this, American foreign policy aims at social reconstruction through promoting ‘values’—often the new, Western, post-Christian vices more than anything else, such as homosexuality, transgenderism, and abortion. 

Rome understood its greatest benefit in the world to be its establishment of the rule of law.  The pax Romana was due not only to military conquest but especially to lex Romana.  Certainly economic exploitation followed as well (as Revelation 18 notes).  People were enslaved in large numbers.  It is impossible to promote Roman imperialism as a model for today, but the ideal of engagement not through warfare, economic exploitation, and social imperialism but through the establishment of law and order would be worth considering.  The populations of Haiti and Venezuela would surely welcome this, even if the next generation would have to declare its independence from America.  Tyranny is always a problem, and the option of socialism thought to be so kind by many in the West is not only bad economic policy but also the seed of tyranny.  Rome’s imperialism brought Roman culture and rule to other parts of the world, not always in commendable ways.  Yet Dionysius also stated that Romulus respected regional differences and judgements.  Rome’s extension of peace to other regions was also  through its provision of Roman law.  Paul recognised this in principle in Romans 13.1-7, despite all the horrors of Rome we could also cite in another part of the leger (Revelation).

Romulus did not solve all the problems of society in his day and will not do so today.  Dionysius even begins his description of Romulus’ rule by noting that Romulus understood that all forms of government had their weaknesses and problems.  Yet a comparison of Romulus’s solutions in his time to the current dialogue seems to provide some surprising options that are ‘outside the box’.  Many of his solutions are not options as such, but some creative adjustments are possible.  Perhaps some Central European countries that still embrace both conservative European and Christian values to some degree will provide helpful alternatives for the West, if the West would only give up its obviously failing agendas, ridiculous new values, and anti-Christian bias.

Our Bodies as Living Sacrifices, Holy and Acceptable to God: The People of God and the Relationship between Theology and Ethics in Romans

 

What is the relationship between theology and ethics?  Paul often follows a theological section in his letters with an ethical section.  This division comes in Galatians 5.1: ‘For freedom Christ has set us free; stand firm therefore, and do not submit again to a yoke of slavery’ (ESV throughout, unless stated otherwise). In Romans, the transition is:

I appeal to you therefore, brothers, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God, which is your spiritual worship. 2 Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that by testing you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect (12.1-2).

Both transitions show that ethics is not only related to but dependent upon theology.  This ‘theology’ is not mere doctrine; it is a new reality.  Christians are ‘set free’; they have experienced the ‘mercies of God’, a transformation by the renewal of their minds.  In 2 Corinthians 5.17, Paul forcefully stated: ‘If anyone is in Christ—new creation!  The old things have passed away; behold!, the new things have come’ (my translation).

The little word ‘by’ in ‘by the mercies of God’ in1 Romans 12.1 (ESV and NRSV) could be translated in a variety of ways: ‘by means of’, ‘through’, ‘because of’.  However, translations that suggest the relationship between the theology of Romans 1-11 and the ethics of Romans 12.1-15.13 is only God’s forgiveness (mercy) and our response of gratitude sorely miss the mark. The New Living Translation has: ‘… give your bodies to God because of all he has done for you.’  The New International Version similarly has, ‘…in view of the mercies of God.’  These do not capture the heart of Romans or the meaning of Romans 12.1-2.

By this point in Romans, Paul has argued so much more: God’s mercies are not merely forgiving mercies but also transformational.  Hence, Paul says in Romans 12.2: ‘be transformed by the renewal of your mind.’  Recall that the problem Paul sets out to answer in Romans 1.28 was that God had given humanity in its sins over to a ‘debased mind’.  Now, because of the mercies of God, Christians are no longer slaves under the power of the world but are free to live for Christ, have renewed minds, and once again know the moral will of God.  In light of the sacrifice of Christ, in light of the empowering Spirit of God, in light of God’s forgiving and transforming grace and mercies, Christians are different and can live differently.

What is the difference?  Romans 12.1 says that we are to be a ‘living sacrifice’ that is ‘holy and acceptable to God’.  First, instead of turning away from God to live apart from Him and for ourselves—illustrated in terms of idolatry and homosexuality in Romans 1.18-28—we are now to approach God with our whole lives, offering ourselves to Him.  Second, we are to offer our transformed selves, holy and acceptable to God because of the mercies He has wrought within us, as our appropriate worship. 

We could never have offered ourselves to God without His mercies that have transformed us into a holy and acceptable people.  As Paul says in Ephesians, God ‘chose us in Christ before the foundation of the world to be holy and blameless before him’ (1.4).  Colossians 1.22 adds, ‘and above reproach’.  Ephesians 5.25-27 says that Christ’s love for the Church means that He gave Himself for her, sanctified her, cleansed her, and presented her to Himself without spot or wrinkle, holy and without blemish.  This is the language of sacrifice in the Old Testament.[1]  A priest, too, was not to have a blemish when offering sacrifices as this would profane God’s sanctuaries; but the LORD was the One who makes the priests holy (Leviticus 21.21-23). 

If Paul’s point in Romans 12.1 was one of forgiveness alone, he might have said that God forgives us even though we inevitably offer impure sacrifices to Him, given our fallenness or sin.  However, all of Romans 1-11 has argued something different: God transforms us to be holy and acceptable before Him.  We do not live in Romans 1.24-28 with debased minds.  Nor do we live in Romans 7.7-25 with divided selves and a powerless Law.  We live in the reality of Romans 8.1-17 that makes us holy and acceptable to God—by His mercy and grace, not our works.

Christian ethics is not a Christian ethical system that is for the whole world.  It is something that Christians alone can live because of the change that life in Christ has brought. It is an act of worship, a presenting of an offering to God of our very lives that is holy and blameless because the LORD has made us holy by His mercies and grace.  No longer living in conformity to the world, we are transformed by the renewing of our minds.  With such a transformation, we no longer offer worship to false gods but to the true God (Romans 1.18-23), and we no longer dishonour our bodies with dishonourable passions contrary to nature (homosexual relationships) (Romans 1.24-28).  Instead, we are to offer our bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God (Romans 12.1).



[1] In Leviticus alone, 1.3, 10; 3.1, 6; 4.3, 23, 28, 32; 5.15, 18; 6.6; 9.2-3; 14.10; 22.19-21; 23.12, 18.

Unconditional?

‘Oh, hello.  I see you signed up to see me with the name ‘John’.  Please, have a seat, and what is your surname, by the way?’

‘Thank you.  This seat?’  ‘Yes, certainly.  And I’ll sit here’ motioning to the sofa.  ‘Thank you again.  Ben Zacharias, that is my surname,’ the visitor said in a heavy accent that caught a guttural ‘ch’ and rolled the ‘r’.  ‘Middle East?  Is that an accent from the Middle East?’  ‘Ah, yes.’

The two settled down, and the pastor continued.  ‘So, I am Pastor Andy.  We are informal around here.  Now, what would you like to talk about?’

‘The Kingdom of God.’

‘Oh, very well, a theological conversation.  Perhaps I mentioned this in a recent sermon.’

‘No.  I am sorry, but I have not yet visited your church.  I am, where I come from, a speaker like you who draws the occasional crowd.  People say that all Israel has come out to hear me, but I’m sure that is an exaggeration.  My topic is the Kingdom of God.’

‘Very interesting,’ Andy said, politely, but inwardly a little put out that someone had signed up to have a session with him and had come to speak rather than to listen.  Who wouldn’t be?  He checked his watch quickly.  ‘So, the Kingdom of God.  Truly a great subject, isn’t it?’

‘It is the subject,’ answered John.  ‘I tell people that it is near.’

‘Well,’ said Andy with a smile, ‘I know of another person with your name who lived a long time ago.  He also preached that the Kingdom of God is near.’

The visitor smiled.  He pulled out a jar of honey from his satchel.  ‘Please,’ he said, offering the pastor the jar.  ‘This is for you.  It comes from my country.  Shalom.’

‘I don’t suppose you have any locusts to go with it?’ Andy joked.

‘You eat locusts?’ asked John in all seriousness, fingering inside his satchel.

‘No, no!  I was just joking a little.’

‘I saw in the paper,’ John continued, ‘that your church is hosting a conference this month.’

‘Oh, yes.  Our ‘Unconditional’ conference.  Will you be coming?’

‘My question is this word, ‘unconditional’.  Help me with that, please.’

‘Well, good, let’s look at it with this theme of the Kingdom of God you mention.  Jesus brought the Kingdom, didn’t He?  And He fellowshipped with tax collectors, prostitutes, and sinners of all sorts.  This offended the Pharisees, who used the Old Testament Law to beat people up with their sins, so to speak, leaving them no better off afterwards.  They thought of themselves as too holy to associate with sinners.  But Jesus taught unconditional love.  Love the sinner, even if you hate the sin.’

‘I actually know Jesus, too,’ said John.  ‘He did as you say when He was among us.  There is this one additional thing, though.  He fellowshipped with sinners, taught them about the Kingdom of God, and spoke about Kingdom righteousness.  You might say He fellowshipped with sinners unconditionally, but the path of righteousness  to the Kingdom was hard and the gate to enter small, He said.  He didn’t pave the road and widen the gate unconditionally.’

‘Well, we are concerned that people are too hard on matters like this.  We don’t want to shut down the Kingdom to people, as though we are the Pharisees ourselves.’

‘The Pharisees were also sinners,’ said John.  ‘They were hypocrites.  Their problem was not that they followed the Law but saying they followed the Law and then not doing it.  And they used the Law to limit the call to righteousness of the heart to mere actions.  Jesus fellowshipped with them as sinners, like the tax collectors and prostitutes, but He called them all to repentance and a righteousness of the heart.  He did not accept any of them ‘unconditionally’, as you say.’

‘We think that, well….  I recently told this congregation to ‘unhitch’ their theology from the Old Testament!’ [cf. https://www.christianpost.com/news/andy-stanley-to-host-conference-for-christians-with-lgbt-kids.html] 

‘I see,’ said John.  ‘Like “Thou shalt not murder?  Thou shalt not commit adultery?"’

‘Oh, no, we are not promoting murder or adultery!’ said Andy, but he wondered how he could recover.  He checked his watch and thought, ‘I need to signal that this conversation is not going to go on.’  ‘Nothing like that,’ he said.

‘Oh, theology, not ethics?’ asked John.

‘Well, I did say theology.  But I really just meant the Law.  The Law has come to an end, right?  [Romans 10.4] Didn’t Paul say that?’

‘Hmm.  I think the simple answer to that is that Paul’s point was that the Law as a way to establish righteousness failed because all it does is expose sin.  We need the Spirit of God to empower us to live righteously.  He wasn’t downgrading the morality of God’s Law in the Old Testament.  Jesus proclaimed the Kingdom of God, and He said that He had not come to abolish the Law and the prophets but to fulfill them [Matthew 5.17].  That is, the Old Testament.  If we are going to talk about Jesus and Paul, there is no unhitching a Christian congregation from the Old Testament.’

‘Well, let’s focus on this.  Jesus said that He desired mercy, not sacrifice [Matthew 9.13; 12.7].  He said that the greatest commandments are love of God and love of neighbour [Luke 10.27].’

‘Yes.  The problem was when people interpreted the Law without mercy, but the solution was not to preach mercy without the Law.  Jesus said that on the two greatest commandments hang all the Law and the prophets [Matthew 22.37-39].  Again, He did not oppose the Law, not a jot of it!’

Andy said nothing.  This was not the conversation he wanted, and he had a lot of planning to do for the ‘Unconditional’ conference.  John spoke up again.  ‘In my ministry, proclaiming that the Kingdom of God is near is a call to repentance, not acceptance of people in their sins.  Mercy is forgiveness, not license.  To love God is to obey His commandments [Deuteronomy 6.4-9].  To love one’s neighbour is to do what the Law tells us to do in our relationships—even with our enemies.  When people come to hear me speak about being ready for the coming of God’s reign, they hear that this means repenting for sin, not being welcomed as we are in ongoing sin.  There is nothing more unloving than to tell people God will accept them in their sin rather than cleanse them from their sin when we all know that we must all face the final judgement and give an account to God for what we have done in the flesh.  It is like telling a person on a train headed to a broken bridge that the trip is safe because he or she wants to be comforted.  The loving thing to do is tell them to get off the train.  If people hearing me want to repent, I baptize them.  Their sins are washed away.  They are clean.  They don’t head right back to their sins but change their lives and follow Jesus.’

Andy made an obvious look at his watch and said, ‘Well, yes, this has been a very good chat.  Thank you for stopping by.  I see our time has passed quickly.’  He stood up.

John stood up as well.  ‘Thank you for your time,’ he said, politely.  ‘But if I may say in parting, when it comes to the Kingdom of God, I can only say it is conditional.  In fact, Paul said to the Corinthians,

 Or do you not know that the unrighteous will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived: neither the sexually immoral, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor men who practice homosexuality, 10 nor thieves, nor the greedy, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor swindlers will inherit the kingdom of God. 11 And such were some of you. But you were washed, you were sanctified, you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and by the Spirit of our God.

'He got that list of sins largely from the Old Testament, didn’t he?  That word ‘homosexuality’, for example, comes right from Leviticus 20.13. It means something like ‘men who go to bed with other men for sexual relations as a man does with a woman.’  You used to use the word ‘sodomy’ for that in English, and now the word is ‘homosexuality’.  In Greek, it is actually a unique word—actually two words in Leviticus that Paul turns into one Greek word from his Greek Old Testament [arsen + koitai]—and by its uniqueness, we know that Leviticus 20.13 is being referenced.  By this, then, Paul was affirming the Law, not unhitching the Church from it.  And when he says that such sinners were now washed, sanctified, and justified (or made righteous), he was speaking of the grace and mercy they found in the Lord Jesus Christ because their sins were forgiven and their lives were turned around, and he was speaking of the transformation of their lives by the Holy Spirit.  The Kingdom righteousness of God is so conditional, in fact, it required the gracious sacrifice of Jesus Christ on the cross for our sins and the empowering presence of God the Spirit to bring about the change in us.  This is why I preach the condition of repentance and baptise sinners.’

With that, he walked to the door, and, as he did so, Pastor Andy noticed John's peculiar shirt and leather belt.  And then, of all things, a locust jumped out of his satchel.

‘Nobody in Wonderland believes we can define a “woman”’

‘What are you?’ asked Alice.  Humpty Dumpty narrowed his eyes and looked at her.  ‘Is that a trick question?’ he retorted.  ‘No more than you are a trick to the eye,’ she replied.  The egg shifted his weight on the wall.  ‘I might ask you the same question,’ he stated.  ‘Well, that is easy,’ she said.  ‘I’m a girl.’

 ‘A "girl," you say.'  He paused.  ‘Is that your final answer?  I mean, in this world, we are masters of words rather than they of us.  We are as we identify.  You say you are a girl, but how do you identify?  I might, as a matter of fact, say that I am a hippopotamus.’

‘But you are not a hippopotamus,’ replied Alice.  ‘A hippopotamus has four legs, a very big head and a tremendously wide mouth, and it lollygags about all day in the river.’

‘Well,’ said the egg, ‘if I were to attach four legs, alter my head and mouth, and removed myself from this wall to the river, then would you be content to acknowledge that I am a hippopotamus?’

‘An egg, however much altered, is still an egg,’ replied Alice.

‘Ah, so you think me an egg, do you, as some sort of objective fact?’

‘Quite so.  A rather large one.  A talking one at that.  But, in essence, an egg.’

‘In essence?’

‘I don’t want to be rude in saying this, but if I were to smack you on the side of your body with the back side of a spoon, I believe that you would crack and out would flow some white and yellow eggy substance.’

‘That does strike me as rude, but not for saying you might smack me with a spoon.  You are frightfully rude to make assumptions about me.  In reducing me to what you assume by mere observation in past situations, you claim an authority over me just as words insist on their definitions and make us all abide by them.  What if you performed your little spoon experiment and out flew four-and-twenty blackbirds?  Would you then call me a pie?’

‘Well, I shouldn’t call you an egg, in that case, because there is no definition of an egg that would fit such a wonder.’

‘There you are again, with your words and definitions.  I might call you a tyrant in that regard if it weren’t for the uncertainty of meaning, about which I am firmly resolved.’

‘If words are uncertain and we can give them any meaning, and if identity is uncertain and can in any case change, why should we accept yours?  If word definitions are tyrants, why isn’t your choice of identity over against my observations not also tyranny?’

‘Because if you don’t, you will hurt my feelings.’

‘Very well,’ said Alice.  ‘Shall I call you a pie?’

‘A blackbird pie,’ said Humpty Dumpty.

‘And the spoon experiment?’ asked Alice.

‘If I am a blackbird pie, it is not because I can be proven to be so with your spoon but because this is how I choose to identify.’

‘And should I wish to make a cake or provide companionship to two strips of bacon and some toast on a plate, might I expect from this that you would not prove useful?  Or is it that you would not prove willing?  And if you were useful, even against your will, might I add, what then?  Would we need to retreat from our playtime and accept that you are, after all, an egg?’

‘You horrible little girl!’ said Humpty Dumpty, displaying very hurt feelings.

‘Girl?’ said Alice.  ‘Suppose I were to insist that I am a boy, despite appearances.’

‘Oh, then I would call you a boy.’

‘But then I would still be the tyrant, would I not?’

‘You seem to have scrambled everything,’ said the would-be blackbird pie.

‘I’ve done nothing of the sort,’ said Alice.  ‘You are the one who wishes to have private, scrambled meanings and expect everyone to play along.  You pretend to be offended if someone does not play your little tyranny identity game.  But might I suggest that this is why you are stuck on this wall with no friends?  And I am growing curiouser and curiouser,’ she said, pulling out a spoon from under her apron.

Humpty Dumpty drew back—a little too far back.  He fell right off the wall to the ground.  A small crack appeared on his belly, and then several others from there.  He looked up at Alice.

‘Don’t you worry,’ said Alice.  ‘I shall get help.’

In just a short while, she reappeared with all the king’s horses and all the king’s men.  They bent over the egg, out of which was oozing albumen.  ‘This is serious,’ said a poultryman, ‘No one has ever unscrambled an egg.’  ‘We shall need some nail polish for sealing egg shells,’ said another.  ‘I have some,’ said Alice.

‘But I don’t identify as an egg,’ said a feeble voice.

‘Ignore this nonsense,’ said one of the king’s men.  Alice brushed the cracks with the nail polish. 

‘Very good.  Now gently roll him over,’ said the king’s man.  To everyone’s horror, the egg was cracked everywhere, with yoke pouring from it.

‘I’m afraid,’ Alice said to Humpty Dumpty, ‘that your yoke is broken.’ 

‘I’m not an egg,’ Humpty Dumpty protested, his voice fading.

‘Well, for the record,’ said Alice, ‘I am a girl, no matter what word games or identity games you play here.  And one day I shall be a woman, and that means that I shall marry a man and have children.  And I’m quite sure that they will like hard boiled eggs to accompany their bacon and toast.’

The egg motioned for her to come closer.  He whispered in her ear, ‘Nobody in Wonderland believes that we can define a “woman.”’  With that, he cracked up.

The Second Week of Advent: Preparing for the peace of God

[An Advent Homily] The second Sunday in Advent carries the theme, ‘preparation for the peace of God’.   That peace comes with the birth of C...

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