In a lengthy response to my comments on Bill Moyer's interview with Jeremiah Wright, Cory Heidelberger accuses me of "prooftexting" (building an interpretation on short passages, taken out of context), as opposed to exegesis (careful reading of passages in light of the larger meaning of a text). Cory's is well-argued, and I recommend it to our readers. Despite our disagreements, I respect Cory and think that he is fine addition to the Keloland blog page. He says I was flat wrong in my piece, but I tried to be fair to Reverend Wright, and at least some of what I say agrees with what Cory says, so perhaps I was wrong only in a bumpy way.
Let me be honest. I am not so inclined as he is to see truth and light in Reverend Wright's sermons. Suppose the tables were turned, and we were talking about a conservative pastor who said "Not God Bless Homosexuals, but Goddamn Homosexuals"? Suppose the same pastor presented a long list of the sins of Homosexuals and then said that the AIDS epidemic was "the chickens coming home to roost"? How much "exegesis" would it take to convince Cory that this pastor didn't mean what he surely seemed to be saying? Cory would vehemently condemn such a sermon, especially if it came from someone who had political significance. I would condemn such a sermon along with Cory.
I am sorry, but the defense of Wright's infamous "Goddamn America" statement presented in the interview, and backed up by Cory, just won't do. It is true that condemnation and damnation have a "shared etymology." So do inspiration and respiration, but they hardly mean the same thing! Surely "Goddamn" can mean condemnation in ordinary speech; but in a sermon, delivered by a Biblical scholar standing in the pulpit, it means one thing: final judgment. I tried to be charitable by calling this a rhetorical excess. But if, as Cory insists, Reverend Wright believes everything he said, then we know what he thinks of America. Barack Obama found it necessary to disown such statements. Perhaps Cory is wiser than Obama, or perhaps Obama was being less than truthful about his agreement. I will let Cory decide that one.
Both Moyers and Wright and Heidelberger want to have it that the good Reverend is being crucified for "speaking truth to power," i.e., criticizing America. Of course crucified is here a metaphor for political attacks (which, I dare to point out) are not so painful or fatal), but it is still just wrong. Wright's sermons became radioactive for Obama because of the extreme rhetoric that he used. Like Moyers, Cory ignores a couple of other items that populate these sermons: that the government intentionally supplies drugs to Blacks, and that the government "lied about inventing the AIDS virus." Are these among the "truths" that Wright speaks to power?
I think that people like Jeremiah Wright have an important place in Republican politics. We need him to play prophet to our Israel. But his extremism discredits his message. In calling these statements "rhetorical excesses", I believe I was doing him more favors that Mr. Heidelberger does by trying to neutralize them with exegesis.
Cory says this:
Mrs. Madville Times and I watched the full interview last night. (It was worth cheating on TV Turnoff Week.) We listened closely. Neither one of us heard Wright say anything that disagreed with our political beliefs, our patriotism, or with Christianity.
But that, of course, is the problem for Mr. Obama. He already has Mr. and Mrs. Madville Times, or surely will if he is nominated. It's those small town voters still clinging to religion and guns, some of whom, at least, are Democrats, who would find plenty to disagree with in Wright's sermons. I have a higher opinion of such folks than Obama, or Wright, or Heidelberger. I do not believe, as Cory seems to believe, that any Americans pray to George W. I think that most Americans know, and are willing to hear, that their country has much to atone for. They do not, as Cory would have it, conflate their faith with patriotism. But neither do they think that America is Pharaoh and Caesar. We are sinners, but we aren't the bad guys.
Suppose for the moment that the United States had never existed. Would the world today be a better place or a much worse place? I would like to think that Cory would agree with me on this one. I am not sure what Barack Obama would say, if he were being honest, and that concerns me a lot more. I am pretty sure what Reverend Wright would say.
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