Woke in the WELS: Social Justice goes to (a WELS) Church

"These enthusiasts [Schwärmer] likewise drag the evangelical freedom and equality in Christ down into earthly political things and show that they have no idea of the spirituality and splendor of the kingdom of Christ." - C.F.W. Walther

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"Today women have rightly progressed in their rights as citizens of the United States in many needed ways ... as you look at the story, God is unraveling slavery! ... we don't have slavery, but we have incarceration, and we incarcerate everybody because we have no other tool to use to deal with problems"

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These are quotes from a sermon preached by now-retired Pastor James Behringer. At the time Rev. Behringer was the Director of WELS Special Ministries, serving as a substitute Pastor this particular Sunday.  Feminism, slavery and prison reform are of course hallmark topics of the Social Justice Warriors. Even just a few years ago, I would lament that books like Jon Harris' Social Justice Goes to Church had so much low-hanging-fruit to pick from in the Evangelical world, and that our issues in confessional Lutheranism, particularly in the Wisconsin Synod, were more nuanced ... but I have since, unfortunately, been proven wrong time and time again. Instead of righteous indignation, I'd rather see what our fathers in the faith have had to say about this pericope and these topics. 

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The pericope is Philemon. Let's just cut the slavery argument off at the knee:

"Like all other books of Scripture, this one does not overturn the existence of slavery, but it asks for a consideration of the slave above and beyond his economic status." - (Rev. Dr. Adam Koontz, Family Bible Commentary)

"It is well to remember, in view of the numerous passages throughout the Bible which treat of slavery, that the institution of slavery is not intrinsically and fundamentally wrong from a Biblical standpoint. While a Christian may hold the opinion that it is far better, from a social and economic view-point, that slavery should not be tolerated in a state or country, he will still maintain that, according to the clear expression of God's will in His word, even Christians could possess slaves or sanction their holding. (Paul Kretzmann, Commentary on Philemon)

"To instruct people of various social positions, St. Paul also instructs the slaves of their duties. Here we have to accept that the Gospel does not abolish civil slavery or the difference between freedmen and slaves. Indeed, as the Gospel confirms other political issues, so it also confirms freedom, dominion and slavery. Other testimony by St. Paul regarding masters and slaves must be viewed in the same manner, in opposition to that of the Schwärmgeister (those filled with the spirit of religious visions) who strive to abolish dominion, property rights, slavery, and similar political orders. Without doubt, at the time of our church’s beginning there were some, wrongly informed, who had similar views, as if man ought not be burdened with slavery. These views caused dissension among the slaves. For these reasons St. Paul often repeats the relevant commandment, adding that they should not desecrate the Gospel. For men, upon hearing that the Gospel negates political relationships, become fearful of the Gospel and insult it. Even believers must diligently beware of such vexations. (Caspar Cruciger, In epist. Pauli ad Tim. Argentor, 1540, pp. 257-258, courtesy of Old Lutherans)

"Thus, a Christian believer is now completely free/ and a master of all things/ that he may and should also be the servant of all men and subject to everyone, because Christian liberty is in the spirit, and should not become a cloak for the flesh and for unbridled evil. For this reason, in our kingdom, in addition to the freedom of the gospel, there may well be civic slavery or serfdom, by which a Christian is subject to and obligated to pay taxes, duties, customs, taxes, duties and what other such subserviencies there are. But that one may be and remain a Christian, even if he is a serf or slave, so that there is no harm to Christian liberty, and that servitude is an ancient thing, may be proven out of the Testament [of Scripture] in an insurmountable way. (Urbanus Rhegius, courtesy of Rev. Karl Hess)

“You [peasants] assert that no one is to be the serf of anyone else, because Christ has made us all free. That is making Christian freedom a completely physical matter. Did not Abraham [Gen. 17:23] and other patriarchs and prophets have slaves? Read what St. Paul teaches about servants, who, at that time, were all slaves. This article [of the peasants], therefore, absolutely contradicts the gospel. It proposes robbery, for it suggests that every man should take his body away from his lord, even though his body is the lord’s property. A slave can be a Christian, and have Christian freedom, in the same way that a prisoner or a sick man is a Christian, and yet not free. This article would make all men equal, and turn the spiritual kingdom of Christ into a worldly, external kingdom; and that is impossible. A worldly kingdom cannot exist without an inequality of persons, some being free, some imprisoned, some lords, some subjects, etc.; and St. Paul says in Galatians 5 that in Christ the lord and the servant are equal.” (Luther's Works, 18:326-327, courtesy of Back to Luther)

Quite simply, to say that God was unravelling slavery puts one outside of confessional Lutheranism. It opens up the charge of Marcionism. It makes Paul contradict himself: the same man who calls himself a slave of Christ (Romans 1) tells Timothy (1 Timothy 6) to admonish slaves to obey their masters, and especially when their masters are believers. It is widely held that the epistle to Timothy post-dates Philemon: if God through Paul was unraveling slavery in Philemon, what do we make of these further admonitions from Paul, slave of Christ? Was Paul deconstructing his previously declared relationship of slave to Christ? By no means!

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On to feminism. Walther makes the connection between (first wave) feminism and abolitionism:

"We therefore hold that abolitionism, which deems slavery a sin and therefore considers every slave holder a criminal and strives for its eradication, is the result of unbelief in its development of nationalism, deistic philanthropy, pantheism, materialism, and atheism. It is a brother of modern socialism, Jacobinism and communism. Together with the emancipation of women it is the rehabilitation of the flesh. As proof of this blood-relationship it suffices to point not only to its history, but also to the close union between abolition-minded representatives of Christianity and the abolitionist tendencies of anti-Christians and radical revolutionaries in church, state, and home. The more their non-religiosity increases and reaches the pinnacles of theoretical atheism and indifferentism, the more fanatically they fight for the principle of slave emancipation. Often they have no economic interests and even oppose those who do. Therefore, a Christian abolitionist, who finds himself in the company of such as these, should become aware of the wrong path he has chosen. How could it be possible that these enemies of Christianity and religion per se, all those who are intent on doing away with the existing religious, political, and economical order of things to realize their humanistic utopia, that especially they would be so enthusiastic for something good and holy, for “the final reason of Christianity” and so greatly exert themselves? Can a Christian accept that now, in the 19th century, Christ’s word has come to naught through progress, enlightenment, and civilization? “Can grapes be harvested from thorns, or figs from the thistle tree? A rotten tree does not bear fruit.” We can only pity those Christians who have forgotten all this and with best intentions, in the desire to work for a Christian-humane purpose, have allied themselves with the enemies of Christendom, and have come under the banner of anti-Christian humanism and philanthropy, thus having lent themselves as mediums of the spirit of the age." (“Slavery, Humanism, and the Bible”: Selections from Lehre und Wehre, courtesy of Old Lutherans)

Bear in mind, Walther speaks of merely first-wave feminism, not to speak of our current iterations. Our confessions also speak clearly:

"The Gospel teaches an eternal righteousness of the heart. Meanwhile, it does not destroy the State or the family, but very much requires that they be preserved as ordinances of God, and that charity be practiced in such ordinances." (Melanchthon, AC XIV)

Philemon unravels slavery to the same extent as Galatians 3:28 unravels gender.

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A more appropriate exegesis might be as follows:

"It was the normal practice for households to conform to the religious affiliations and practices of the householder, paterfamilias or οἰκοδεσπότης. When the paterfamilias underwent conversion or change of allegiance, it would have been entirely normative for other members of the household to transfer their loyalties accordingly... This [conversion to the master’s religion] would not have been a voluntary act but rather involuntary conformity, willing or unwilling, with the decision and action of the paterfamilias." N.H. Taylor, “Onesimus: A Case Study of Slave Conversion in Early Christianity,” Religion and Theology 3 (1996): 262; as cited in CTQ Vol 74 No 3-4, pg. 298.

Paul's admonition to Philemon, in this light, is one of informing him that Onesimus is now a true brother in Christ, and not just a performative Christian.

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Have we lost the faith of our fathers? Do we need to repent of assuming the world's post-modern, post-war consensus, feminist frame? We close with a continuation of the opening quote from Walther:

"It is a precious, comforting truth that whomsoever the son makes free, is free indeed [John 8:36] and that in Christ there is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither bond nor free, there is neither male nor female [Gal. 3:28]; but this freedom and equality in Christ in no way implies an equally free position in civil and political life, just as the poverty of the latter in no way removes or diminishes the former."