Beware of Greeks bearing gifts (Virgil & Fitzgerald, p35, line 70). This phrase, loosely translated from a line in Virgil’s retelling of the legend of the Trojan War (Aeneid ,Book 2), is not altogether different from the words of Sophocles’ famed hero Ajax who, repudiating the gift of Hector, proclaimed, “the gifts of enemies are no gifts, and bring no good” (Wilcock, 1998, p. 71). Whether it be the unexpected gift of yesterday’s foe or the poisoner’s jovial offering of a carefully crafted beverage, we ought always to tread cautiously when new gifts lie at our gates. Sadly, as was the case of Virgil’s Trojan priest who warned of the suspected menace hidden in the belly of the wooden horse, such warnings are often perceived as dour invectives that ruin the optics of progress. I am afraid we find ourselves in the same predicament within the Apostolic community.
Bricks and BLM
Inventive collaborators on the plains of Shinar seem to have little in common with the Black Lives Matter movement. Until, that is, one examines the engineers whose brick and bitumen are carefully constructing a collaborative monolith. Today, in this toxic culture of narcissism that indulges the entitled egos of fragile students seeking unmerited distinctions, I am sure the tower and the city would be lauded as a symbol of progressive achievement. Indeed, in a culture trapped in the echo chamber of progressive groupthink, collective activism that seeks to make a name for itself is the gold-standard of societal enlightenment. Yet, amidst the din of such progress the cautionary aphorism that, “not everything that glitters is gold” gently falls on ears that will hear.
As it relates to the city and the tower being erected on the Shinarian plain, God’s appraisal of its progress is very telling. “Let us go down, and there confound their language, that they may not understand one another’s speech” (Gen. 11:7). Why this dramatic response to what should have been lauded as progress? “Behold,” God said, “the people is one, and they have all one language; and this they begin to do: and now nothing will be restrained from them, which they have imagined to do” (11:6). God finds no issue with invention and progress; it’s the imagining that is the problem.
Humanity, since its first disastrous encounter with unexplored knowledge in the Garden, tends to exaggerate human awareness, discovery, and creativity. We take ourselves too seriously and we often forget that, while we can be like God, we can never be God. The subtle sarcasm of the Hebraic phrase benei ha-`adam (children of earth) coupled with the figurative descent of God who must “come down” to see this tower is center stage in the Babel story. God mocks this absurd overreach of man’s agnostic intellectualism and progress!
It’s sobering, in light of a society that is so quick to throw its support into anything appearing to be ethically, morally, or socially progressive, to consider how easily we could have thrown our support behind the monolithic empire of Babel. How many books would we have purchased from Babel’s engineers? How quickly would we have granted them honorary degrees, sought them as keynote speakers, or pitifully groveled at their feet so that we could have them pull up a seat to our sacred tables of influence and fellowship? Yet, beyond the bricks that erect a façade of progress and success rests imaginings contrary to the purpose and the plan of God.
Behind the Bricks
In a now-removed statement from the BLM website, the organization laid out one of its missional statements as follows: “We disrupt the Western-prescribed nuclear family structure requirement by supporting each other as extended families and ‘villages’ that collectively care for one another, especially our children, to the degree that mothers, parents, and children are comfortable” (web.archive.org). For those familiar with Marxism, the disruption of the nuclear family is one of the key ideological tenants of the radical ideas espoused by Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels in the Communist Manifesto. In a video from 2015 (Real News Network, 2015), one of the co-founders of the organization unapologetically explained that she, along with a fellow founder, were trained Marxists whose activism was built upon the Manifesto’s ideological framework.
This admitted Marxist dialectic coupled with a woke ideology of intersectionality that is woven into the core values of the BLM organization ought to have resulted in widespread ecumenical alarm, but it did not. Instead, we found ourselves as either observers or participators of widespread capitulation that resulted in public displays of solidarity that were largely motivated by ignorance that was underscored by a desire to be at the forefront of social change and awareness.
Lacking the aforementioned context regarding the ideological framework of the organization, many found the collective calls against injustice, prejudice, and wrongdoing something that deserved unequivocal support. Desiring to rise to the forefront of the social revolution as religious champions of awareness, change, and solidary many of the narratives, beliefs, and directives of the organization found a pathway into the pulpits and pews of sacred assemblies. An organization that seemed to herald social and ideological progress appearing to be in lockstep with our biblical appeals against injustice and racial divisiveness has instead been the instigator of a climate of hypersensitivity that has catapulted society into new, alarming trends of divisiveness and angst.
While I understand that a large majority of those who embrace the banner and the activism of the movement fail to comprehend the deeply disturbing framework for which it stands, their support for and solidarity with the movement further empower the ideals and beliefs of a worldview that is grossly opposed to biblical truths and ideals. Without context and under the guise of progress, ingenuity, and social enlightenment many come to adopt, embrace or advocate for things contrary to the mind and mission of God.
Academic Trojan Horses
I am afraid, be it the bricks of Babel or the backdrop of BLM, the Apostolic church is falling prey to the allure of things heralded as progress. For years, we have—as a majority—withstood the onslaught of secularism that has pounded against the walls of our salvation. We have weathered the tumultuous storms of doctrinal distortion and we have stood in solidarity against the threat of religious amalgamation that slithered behind the efforts of ecumenical dialogue. We drove wolves from the flocks, revealed the corrupt facade of darkness masquerading as light, and stood as watchmen on the walls trumpeting a certain sound. Then, within the last ten years, we began to hear the decisive groan of gates opening in the waning hours of the day followed by the heavy rumble of a wooden horse that had been left outside our gates.
I speak not of the fabled horse harboring surreptitious Greeks in its belly, but instead, the University—a modern Babel—whose ivory towers of intellectualism have engineered moral decay under the guise of righteous enlightenment. Educational achievement, though commendable and deserving our engagement, has been a means by which secularized imaginings have found entrance into the mission and mindset of the ecclesia. This hyper-infatuation with intellectualism and educational success, albeit exciting, is wooing us into an upside-down paradigm of process that looks down its nose at what it perceives as being ecclesial barbarism; uncivilized, uncouth, and unacculturated churches that lack the prestigious Oscars of the University—the Degrees.
The doctorate, though prestigious and worthy of investiture, has become—for many who claim confederation with the academic elite—a grandiose promotion above the rudimentary ministries given to the church as outlined in Ephesians 4. Slowly—almost imperceptibly—the resolute gates of the Apostolic church are yawning wide to make way for these majestic machinations that seem both a gift and a trophy to the inhabitants within. Yet, as day gave way to night, the prophet was shoved aside to make room for the professor.
Surrounded by walls groaning under the weight of degrees, certifications, and awards the academic elite will pound away on a backlit keyboard as they work on what will become a bestseller on the proper engineering of a harvest when they have never planted a kernel, and most certainly never shucked corn. With our assimilated fascination with academia, we continue to open up the gates to make an entrance for things that glitter with clever intellectualism and reimagined cultural awareness. Those who can scarcely speak English parse Greek from the pulpit, cloaking their insecurities under a false pretense in the attempt to gain acceptance from a classist culture that will secretly mock them as ersatz.
Remember, not everything that glitters is gold, and not every academic achievement is progress for the church. Our enchantment with intellectualism has duped us into the acceptance, tolerance, and support of theories, beliefs, and narratives engineered by godless and deceitful builders and it is influencing the way we are respond to a world mired in a state of confusion. We don’t want Babel’s bricks nor the trojan horse of a woke intellectualism whose words herald goodness but whose motives disperse the opposite. We must stop killing those who stand upon the walls crying out Equō nē crēdite, Teucrī! Quidquid id est, timeō Danaōs et dōna ferentīs!—”Donot trust the horse, Trojans! Whatever it is, I fear the Danaans (Greeks), even when bringing gifts” (Horsfall, 2008, pgs. 4-5).
References
Virgil. & Fitzgerald, R. (1983). The Aeneid. Random House.
Willcock, M. M., S. (1998). Sophocles: Ajax (Classical Texts). United Kingdom: Aris & Phillips.
Real News Network. (2015, July 23). A Short History of Black Lives Matter [Video]. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kCghDx5qN4s&ab_channel=TheRealNewsNetwork
Horsfall, N. (2008). Virgil, Aeneid 2: A Commentary. Netherlands: Brill.