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I Left the Theater Shrugging
October 31, 2012 | 41 comments
Buy the Book
A City in Heaven
Reagan pushed “a city on a hill” into our political lexicon, to the point where the metaphor’s Biblical and Puritan roots lie mostly forgotten.
(Page 2 of 2)
He laments that the phrase has been misused, not only by modern politicians, but by the Puritan himself. Winthrop used the phrase in a far different manner than Jesus, who told his disciples that they, and by extension the church, would witness to the world the faithfulness of a community to God, as an unmistakable light to the world. The metaphor belongs, originally, to the Christian church.
Modern Americans have become unable to hear that original message through the historical noise. It has been co-opted, in much the same way that Lincoln co-opted the Gospel phrase “a house divided.” Mr. Gamble appeals to the church to reclaim the metaphor for itself. It would be an act of service to America, to protect it from false delusions of messianic glory. It would be an act of service to its own members, to remind them of the church’s primary responsibility as witness to Christ.
On November 14, in a speech at the Spectator’s 45th Anniversary Gala to the gathered warriors of the right, who had just about recovered their sense of balance in their wake of the electoral defeat, Senator Tom Coburn roused the room with an appeal to political courage on the model of George Washington’s resistance at Valley Forge. Asking the room to seek conservative wisdom in the great men of history who endured perilous times, he cited the distinction of the ancient Christian theologian Augustine between the city of God and the city of Man. Mr. Coburn invited conservatives to regard the vision of the city of God as their own, a vision in which all individuals are flawed, but welcomed into a political life of shared prosperity on the basis of the acknowledgement of human freedom, liberty, and dignity under one Creator. He contrasted this vision with the leftist ideal of the city of Man, which “offers shared misery through the redistribution of wealth and class envy.” “Their vision,” he said, “is unsustainable, ours is sustainable. Where they offer a rendezvous with debt, we still offer a rendezvous with destiny.”
The old temptation is still at work. Augustine would have resisted this transformation of his meaning. He wrote his City of God shortly after 410 AD, the year when Alaric the Goth sacked Rome. Jerome, the great saint and translator of the Bible from Greek and Hebrew to Latin, wrote in a letter upon hearing the news, “My tongue sticks to the roof of my mouth and sobs choke my speech.” Romans began complaining that the ruin of their city was the fault of the Christians who forced Rome to abandon its old gods. Augustine’s work was a defense of the Christian doctrine that hope lay not in human political organization, no matter how honorable, but a heavenly Kingdom administrated by God.
Using the language of Christian eschatology to shape and to inspire worldly political activity invites false hope and false confidence. A movement charged with that sort of language all too often becomes confident that it, and it alone, participates in a divinely inspired political tradition with Messianic potential. Mr. Gamble’s book, In Search of a City on a Hill, is a light to beat back the darkness of that error.
About the Author
Matthew Taylor is an editorial intern at The American Spectator, with a scholarship from the National Journalism Center. He is a graduate of Hillsdale College. Email him at taylorm@spectator.org or follow him on Twitter @mjohntaylor.
Letter to the Editor View all comments (44) | Leave a comment
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C. Vernon Crisler | 12.13.12 @ 7:05AM
This is an odd review, criticizing a man's metaphors. The phrase city on a hill as used by Puritans is quite understandable in light of the pervasive covenant theology of the Puritans. They really did see themselves as a new Israel in the wilderness, subject to the same blessings and curses as that earlier polity.
Later on, this covenant theology faded into a more secularized view that Providence favored the nation.
Taylor says, "Using the language of Christian eschatology to shape and to inspire worldly political activity invites false hope and false confidence."
Is he saying that Ronald Reagan was wrong for using the metaphor? Is he saying the Lincoln was wrong to use the phrase "house divided"? I cannot see that use of such metaphors is wrong in itself when applied to politics. It just depends on HOW one uses them.
In a real sense, the Puritans WERE forming a city set upon a hill for all the world to see, and Lincoln WAS right (vis-à-vis Douglas) that a house either had to be one thing or another, not both slave and free. And I see nothing wrong with Coburn's metaphor of the city of God and city of man in connection with the last election. As long as these metaphors are expressing a truth in a striking way, and are not just boilerplate, they serve a good purpose, as do all appropriate metaphors.
Lew| 12.13.12 @ 10:05AM
This is an odd comment, speaking without listening.
C. Vernon Crisler | 12.13.12 @ 10:53AM
This is an odd comment on a comment.
C Smith | 12.13.12 @ 11:06AM
Regarding "Covenant Theology":
“On this method [spiritualization] the sacred writings are regarded as an inexhaustible mine of philosophical and dogmatic wisdom; in reality the exegete [Origen] reads his own ideas into any passage he chooses” (The Encyclopedia Britannica, Thirteenth Ed., V20, p. 271, 1926, emphasis added). Unfortunately, the influence of Origen’s undisciplined method of interpretation extends from his day to our own. His subversion of a literal exegesis of Scripture laid the foundation for a number of theologies e.g., Replacement Theology, Reformed Theology, Covenant Theology, and their contemporary counterpart, Preterism.
http://theisraelofgod.blogspot.....-lord.html
C. Vernon Crisler | 12.13.12 @ 11:17AM
No wonder the Encyclopedia Britannica is pretty much out of business.
Appleby| 12.13.12 @ 7:28AM
It's just a relief to me when somebody can make a statement these days that doesn't includ s**t or f**k. By the way, I never had any problem "decoding" Reagan's Shining City On A Hill. Neither did anybody else, that I ever heard.
Purp| 12.13.12 @ 8:20AM
America is once again the "Shining City on a Hill" for the world to admire.
Once Bush was out of office, the Obama Administration reversed his crash of the economy, but also his cavalier and arrogant attitude to our allies, friends and adversaries alike.
Yes, we have a fiscal problem, to raise taxes and cut some spending to get back in balance.
No, we aren't going to go broke and we aren't going to grow our way out of debt. That's a Right Wing World fantasy. Proven false, over and over again.
We want Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, Obamacare, Food Stamps, Aid to Education, Medical and other R&D, a Strong Military, Infrastructure spending, space exploration and much more. So we have to pay for it. Period.
Luckily we've taken our country back from the Tea Bagger types that would bankrupt the country and throw everyone into the street, including themselves (although they are too dumb to know it).
America is stronger today than it was in 2008 and getting stronger every day.
We are an exceptional people, and exceptional country, the indispensable World leader, and once again the "Shining City on the Hill".
Be proud of America's diversity, America's power, and America's position in the world.
C. Vernon Crisler | 12.13.12 @ 8:35AM
Purp, you are a perfect example of what happens when a baby doesn't get enough oxygen in its mother's womb.
Petronius| 12.13.12 @ 1:07PM
That's rich Vern. The rock that Purp was under wished it was on top of some other miscreant.
CrackerHound| 12.13.12 @ 9:53AM
"Be proud of America's diversity"
"Tea Bagger types"
Practice what you preach, a**hole
It doesn't get anymore rich than when a liberal tries to dispense wisdom.
CJW| 12.13.12 @ 10:23AM
Purp the Village Idiot
Now purpie descends into racism:
"Oh, and YOU'RE a LOSER ... can't even beat the black man... you're so awful... hahahaha (that's for your last line, you wanna dish it out, then take it)"
Can't even beat the "black man?" So you believe blacks are inferior and easy to beat.
Keep posting moron, you provide fresh material every day.
You are truly an idiot and a racist
Al Adab| 12.13.12 @ 11:37AM
One begins to wonder if Purp lives (and smokes) in Colorado. It is interesting to have him around to remind us just how far off balance The Left truly is.
Derek Leaberry| 12.13.12 @ 9:28AM
The Puritans were preening nuts who like to lecture to others on why they were so right, more normal people were so wrong and considered cold baked beans as a delicacy. When they lost their original religion in the early 1700s, they turned to other oddball religions and liberal politics and attitudes- free love, Shakerism, Mormonism, abolitionism, feminism and eventually socialism. Ever wonder why Massachusetts is a liberal cesspool? Thank the Puritans.
C. Vernon Crisler | 12.13.12 @ 9:49AM
You're blaming the Puritans because the Unitarians took over Massachusetts? Might as well blame the Puritans for Teddy Kennedy. Where do you get your view of the Puritans -- Hollywood?
Derek Leaberry| 12.13.12 @ 11:43AM
The people of Massachusetts turned their backs on Puritanism a century after Plymouth Rock and many turned to Unitarianism, another left-wing creed.
dominic1955| 12.14.12 @ 3:25PM
The Puritans, like any "holier than thou" sectarians sowed the seeds of their own demise. They set up shop in the New World because they lost out in England. I do not doubt the veracity of their intentions, but once they ceased being the persecuted "remnant" and little flock that spoke nothing but religion all day they set up shop as the new nobility. The old families, the old Ivy League schools all became institutions of American nobility and like most nobility became decadent. Our nobility took the route of soft-headed conservatism turned liberalism. The Episcopalian Church used to be called the "Republican Party at prayer" and now its home to all the enormities of New Agery with Her Popessness Herself at the helm of all the quackery.
dominic1955| 12.14.12 @ 3:48PM
It wasn't only the Puritans, the rest of the old established church groups went the same way. That is why you can, in a way, blame the Puritans for morons like Ted Kennedy. When us Catholics started coming over in droves, like any group of people, we had some that wanted more than anything else to be in with the cool kids. The blue blood descendants of the Puritans might have shed their earlier Calvinism to one degree or another but they didn't shed their hatred of the Romish Church and (in this case) Irish Catholics knew it. Long story short, the Kennedy Coven crawled and scrapped their way into the country clubs of the blue bloods by adopting the cult of the Nations-liberalism. The Kennedy's got some of their liberal Jesuit friends together to justify how they can sell out Catholicism for power and prestige (back in the day when keeping up appearances mattered) and became the first grafted in branches of New England nobility.
Back in Europe, for another example of sectarian purists going wacko, our own Jansenists were demanding and (in their mind) on the straight and narrow as that shining city. When they lost their battle in France with both Crown and Tiara, they fled to Holland to be with their Calvinist buddies and away from the vanities and enormities of Rome. What are they doing now? Ordaining women and marrying gays. The strongest trees bend with the wind, they will outlast it and go right back to business. The rigid stand firm but then splinter and break.
C. Vernon Crisler | 12.15.12 @ 11:17AM
Given all the priestly pederasty scandals, I don't think the Roman denomination has the moral high ground against other denominations.
dominic1955| 12.15.12 @ 1:24PM
Given the lack of a basic grasp of logic in much of society, I am embarrassed to admit I was initially surprised at this comment.
Does the bad behaviour of some people in a group disprove the veracity of that group's truth claims? If a conservative does something immoral or stupid, does that mean conservatism is false?
Then again, if you would be so kind as to point out to me where we teach pederasty is great and promote its practice, I'll eat my biretta.
C. Vernon Crisler | 12.15.12 @ 9:12PM
Tu quoque.
nathan| 12.13.12 @ 10:14AM
We forget and need to remember that almost certainly one of the things that influenced Madison in writing the First Amendment "freedom of conscious" section was "Puritanistan". Those wonderful folks in Boston, praised for fleeing to the New World for freedom of religion didn't practice it once they got here. There executed more than a few people from RI and CT who came north and preached anything those "freedom loving" Puritans considered contrary to the "true faith". Not a whole lot different that muslims today. Madison tried to ensure that wouldn't happen again.
The lesson here is that in our country we've had moments when at least part of our population behaved similarly to the people we are in conflict with now. (The Salem witch trials didn't show us at our best either.) We grew out of it, there's reason to believe they may very well do so too. Remember if you were in Salem back then or in Europe at the time of the Inquisition, how much different would it have been compared to muslim areas today? Not that much. Let's not be too holier than thou here. If any of us were magically taken back in time to Europe during the Inquisition we would be leading the revolt against barbaric popes acting not much different than the imans today.
C. Vernon Crisler | 12.13.12 @ 10:59AM
Nobody practised "freedom of religion" prior to the 1st Amendment. Puritans were no different from Europe in that regard. Madison's clause certainly did not overturn Puritanism. In fact, Massachusetts still had an established church all the way to the 1830s. The 1st Amendment only prevented Congress from setting up an official religion.
Jardino| 12.13.12 @ 10:25AM
"City on hill" might come from the Sermon on the Mount. Jesus tells the people, "You are the light." They are like a city set on a hill and they should let their "light" shine. The most popular interpretation is that we are obligated to influence the world by example and for the Glory of God.
When a Puritan leader used the "city on a hill" symbol in 1630 on a ship headed to the New World, it could have been in the context of escaping religious persecution and the hope offered in the Beatitudes. When Reagan talked about a "shining" city, he was using religion for political purposes.
The photograph of Reagan and the title "A City in Heaven" grabbed my attention. One of my favorite questions for conservatives is, "Will there be private property in heaven?" I only skimmed the article, but it motivated me to read the Bible and reviews of IN SEARCH OF THE CITY ON THE HILL.
In the Puritan New World, nature was bad. Puritans wanted to control nature, espcially "human nature." Maybe the "light" that Jesus mentions is "true" human nature. Puritans were fascinated by the "dark" side of human nature. Today's Evangelical "real" conservatives remind me of the Puritans who felt prosecuted; and ironically, they advocate Big Brother policies to control "human nature."
SilkyWiley| 12.14.12 @ 10:12AM
I find the leftists to be the new puritans.
C Smith | 12.13.12 @ 10:52AM
"We shall be as a city upon a hill. The eyes of all people are upon us so that if we shall deal falsely with our God in this work we have undertaken and so cause Him to withdraw His present help from us, we shall be made a story and a byword throughout the world."
"Remember therefore from whence thou art fallen, and repent, and do the first works; or else I will come unto thee quickly, and will remove thy candlestick... except thou repent" (Revalation 2:5).
TeaPartyNow| 12.13.12 @ 11:59AM
America is today a nation at the painful end of a marxist, welfare state utopia. We will print money & borrow money, all to no avail. We are without limits by the American People.
America is a nation without freedom. & without any self government. Are we a communist nation? A collectivist, dictatorship ruled nation devoid of liberty we are. So really what is in a name? We have no means of freedom.
The things that create freedom in a nation are wholly removed from our society. Truth in media, people connected with each other, community, & having knowledge enough to run governments are all gone. Morality is gone. Faith is in such a state of chaos, that it no longer functions as a tool of freedom.
The American People today are vegetables without any hope.
We must civilly rebel against what has gone wrong. We must feel liberty within our hearts.
We must rebuild freedom from the bare dirt bottom up.
Jardino| 12.13.12 @ 12:43PM
The article is mainly about a book that examines how religion has been used to create an "American myth." It is not about a morally-bankrupt, declining empire.
Marx wasn't totally evil. He thought labor is more important than capital. Adam Smith (father of capitalism) thought capital is more important. Serfs were the labor for fuedal land owners. Slaves were the labor for the pharoahs.
A doctor can deliver a baby and charge $4,000 for something that a woman can do by herself. That is more money than people who pick vegetables in the sun make in 20 weeks. The most powerful union in the USA is the American Medical Association.
The truth is somewhere in the middle. The sooner reactionaries learn to compromise, the sooner our nation can unite and go forward. The American Revolution was a revolution against a monarchy, and sometimes, I think todays's Tea Party would have sided with the monarchy. So many of them have an elitist attitude and are so quick to say the common man is a stupid "vegetable" or "sheep." The Tea Party feels morally superior and acts like they are being persecuted for their beliefs.
The men who signed the Constitution did not agree on everything. Section 8 of the Constitution grants the central government powers to regulate commerce, promote science, tax, borrow money, etc.
POWER TO THE PEOPLE!
C. Vernon Crisler | 12.13.12 @ 1:19PM
The notions of "labor" or "capital" were fallacies of the classical school of economics -- exploited by Marx -- long since overturned by the marginalists, Menger Bohm-Bawerk, Weisser, and many other economists.
SilkyWiley| 12.14.12 @ 10:14AM
I'm afraid we will be in death writhing for a long time.
Ronsch| 12.13.12 @ 12:16PM
Purp cannot see the forest for the trees (that Purp, for your information was a metaphor...)
NerObama is no hero, is not admired around the world, and neither is the US. Open your eyes, for G-Ds sake!!!!
I think you might be of coherent thought, and if you are really older than 12, you will realize that the US was once feared and respected...Because after time in the military and working as a private contractor overseas, I knew I was reasonably safe since no one in their right mind wanted to risk the wrath of the US...The Middle East and Africa only understand fear as a segue to respect.
As far as "Obama reversing the crash of Bush" that is utter nonsense...NerObama was right there voting present or "yea" on every damn spending bill during his short, pathetic tenure in the US Senate.
he is equally guilty along with both aisles of congress...As for the housing bubble, that started with Carter way back when trying to make houses affordable for all, no matter how bad one's credit was, or whether or not the payments could be made, and it continued right through the 1990s with (gasp) Clinton.
Scott W.| 12.13.12 @ 6:16PM
To understand major currents in American politics is to know that it was founded by:
1) racist Europeans
2) religious radicals
3) people who just wanted some land and/or a job
(none of these are mutually exclusive)
From this perspective it's easy to understand a lot of the struggles of American history. The founding fathers understood this, and were afraid that #1 or #2 would come to define us completely, refused to write them into the constitution indefinitely. (#1 was only partly written in to get the support of southern states, #2 definitely was not.)
This also explains the outright slaughter of millions of native Americans and the theft and redistribution of their land to the new Americans (talk about socialist give away, that was one of the largest in history). All the new immigrants had to do was work the bountiful land that they obtained freely or for mere pennies, or with slaves in the case of many families from the south.
The views of #1 and #2 reinforced the view Americans had of themselves as being superior and virtuous, and hence the fortunes from cheap bountiful (in many cases stolen) land and work (#3) were understandable, if not predetermined and the result of godly (resource rich) land, and virtuous people. (cont...)
gray man| 12.14.12 @ 3:31AM
blathering nonsense.
Scott W.| 12.14.12 @ 4:15AM
Intelligent comments would be welcomed...
C. Vernon Crisler | 12.15.12 @ 11:21AM
Where is your evidence that "millions" of Indians were slaughtered by Europeans? BTW, nobody owned any land in America prior to the coming of English law. It was whatever you could win and hold on to and that was true not only for the Europeans but also the Indian tribes.
I should also point out that Indians have also been racists, and even now show it when they speak with contempt of the "white" man.
Scott W.| 12.13.12 @ 6:19PM
The problems in American history usually came about when new immigrants, or existing demographics of group #3 came into conflict with people from group #1 and #2, and their respective views about the "proper"places that ambitious people from #3 should be..i.e. native Americans, African-Americans, women, new ethnic groups like Irish, Italians, Poles..etc.
Usually a political settlement was found when the groups of #1 and #2 scaled back their power and authority, and opened the doors of opportunity and freedom to the new immigrants belonging to #3. Occasionally the group of #2 was split into a progressive (northern group) and a conservative (southern group), meaning the religious radicals sometimes supported horrible oppression and sometimes supported liberation, although even they could be quite wicked i.e. John Brown.
There are remnants of these old power structures of #1 and #2, that for mostly, but not all, reside in the Republican party today. Another problem is that many of the successful families of #3 (and many of them have old European blue blood) have become so successful, that they are indeed so bent on letting no one else competing for their wealth, hence more and more Americans that belong to #3 are giving up on the American dream.
(cont...)
Scott W.| 12.13.12 @ 6:19PM
I see this as the major rift in American politics for the coming decades. Does the uber-rich use the remnants of #1 and #2 to deny access to the new immigrants of #3? Or do perhaps the religious come to the aid of the new immigrants and help break the powerful elites, as they had before, in assisting with abolition, the New Deal, and civil rights.
Just my thoughts. What do you think?
markinla| 12.13.12 @ 8:49PM
I think this is asinine:
This also explains the outright slaughter of millions of native Americans and the theft and redistribution of their land to the new Americans (talk about socialist give away, that was one of the largest in history).
Millions were slaughtered? In what fantasy world.? Yes the natives were treated badly and cheated but the tribes in north America consisted of bands numbering in the thousands. The Cherokee trail of tears only dealt with about 15,000 (46,000 to relocate all the southeast tribes) as did the combined Sioux and Cheyenne forces that Custer stumbled on.
SilkyWiley| 12.14.12 @ 10:16AM
Go ahead and put on your sackcloth and ashes. All history is civilizations rising and subsuming. Are you saying that the native american savages and thier raiding and slavery and torture would be a better civilization on this continent? Selective history?
Scott W.| 12.14.12 @ 11:26AM
No, I didn't write that. I only said that they were killed, and that new European-Americans took their land. Understand?
Scott W.| 12.14.12 @ 4:09AM
Markinla, do you think Custer and the Trail of Tears were the only cases in which Indians were slaughtered?
Fact: estimates of the the pre-Columbus native North American (USA only) population range from 5 to 18 million.
So I ask you, what happened to those millions of native Americans?
Of course many of them died from military entanglements, but many also died from European diseases which were purposely, or coincidentally, given to them. Many died because of the stress from losing their land, losing their way of life, and being forced to live on reservations in which they had no attachment or knowledge of land. For many of the tribes of the Plains, their main food supply was purposely slaughtered, the buffalo.
So if you want to pretend that the new European-Americans did not commit a slow genocide over 500 years of maltreatment of the native Americans, go right ahead. But your opinion would fly in the face of known history.
If "nothing much" had happened to the native American population, then from normal population growth we would expect well over 150 million native Americans today living in the USA.
(see the indigenous roots of many Latin American countries today)
SilkyWiley| 12.14.12 @ 10:18AM
More romanticizing of the native americans. This is silly. History is rising and subsuming civilizations, and a gradual evolution.
Scott W.| 12.14.12 @ 11:28AM
Where the heck was I romanticizing? You need to learn how to read.
Though it's obvious from your comments that you are romanticizing about the so called city-on-the-hill.
C. Vernon Crisler | 12.15.12 @ 11:25AM
Historians have no idea how many Indians lived in America prior to Columbus. The idea that millions died of disease or were killed is just myth-making for political reasons. You also leave out the savagery of the Indians against each other as well as against English settlers. Why?
SilkyWiley| 12.14.12 @ 10:05AM
What is this article about? Some purity? The idea of a city on a hill and the implication is a marvelous emblem for the country, particularly in these lost and profligate times. Or perhaps we should leave all soaring ideas and concept in the dust and sink into the dustbin of history?