[Image: Bell Flower, 2013, JA Van Devender]
Location: Vicinity of Reversing Rapids, St. John, NB, Ca.
Eph 2:14–16
14 For He Himself is our peace, who has made both one, and has broken down the middle wall of separation, 15 having abolished in His flesh the enmity, that is, the law of commandments contained in ordinances, so as to create in Himself one new man from the two, thus making peace, 16 and that He might reconcile them both to God in one body through the cross, thereby putting to death the enmity.
Bob Dylan quoted in today's NYT - [here]
“People at each other’s throats just because they are of a different color. It’s the height of insanity, and it will hold any nation back — or any neighborhood back. Or any anything back. Blacks know that some whites didn’t want to give up slavery — that if they had their way, they would still be under the yoke, and they can’t pretend they don’t know that. If you got a slave master or Klan in your blood, blacks can sense that. That stuff lingers to this day. Just like Jews can sense Nazi blood and the Serbs can sense Croatian blood. It’s doubtful that America’s ever going to get rid of that stigmatization. It’s a country founded on the backs of slaves.”
Bob Dylan's life occupation is to say uncomfortable stuff. That's what it means to be a "provocateur". I sometimes think he would be more effective if he didn't enjoy it so much. Prophets ought to be weepers... Dylan comes across more as the brilliant spoiled brat.
That's what you see in the quote above. On its face it is foolishness, yet it prompts thought, outrage, head-nodding agreement, shrill screams of "I told you so..." Depending on the type and scale of bigotry present in those who read or hear such sentiments, the response is commensurate and defined. The rest of us... well, we just shake our heads and move on. It is Dylan speaking after all.
Dylan simply cannot grasp that it is no longer the 1960's. He is still singing the same song... with the same lyrics.
By the year 2012 fully 8.4% of all US marriages were inter-racial, up from 3.2% in the 1980's. Folks, that's nearly 1 in 10. The largest increase was among the black community. If that doesn't communicate a significant decline in racial hatred in the overall population, I don't know what else it can mean. To state that somehow racial hatred is in our blood... that America can never "get rid" of the stigma of slavery... says more about Dylan and his ilk than it does about our country.
Abusive prejudice, prideful discrimination, unjust intolerance of others are the fruits of sin. These things can be said to be in our blood... that blood we inherited from fallen Adam... but they are in no way limited to racial divisions. They will be present in every racially homogenous society as well... they just won't manifest themselves along racial lines there because those lines aren't present. The root cause is man's self-exaltation.
At the core of every bigot there is the puny idea that nobility is grounded in the distinction between "them and us." This leaves the red-neck white man and the snarling black man on exactly the same plane. They both self-justify and excuse themselves by pointing toward the other and saying "he's worse"... "I may have my faults but at least I ain't no ......." (You fill in the blank) Whether it is Chinese/Vietnamese bigotry, Croatian bigotry, Pure-bloods versus Muggles bigotry, Nazi supremacists versus the entire rest of the world... the root issue is self-exaltation by unjust diminishment of others.
So we must not mistake the symptom for the disease. Racially mixed marriages have husbands and wives who are just as prone to the sin of self-exaltation as the worst racial bigots of either race. Stirring up racial fires may serve to preserve Dylan's nostalgic longings for the "good ole days" when he was on the cutting edge of issues but now... all it does is make him look ludicrous.
Through Christ the enmity that exists between man and man can be solved because through Christ the enmity that exists in the fallen sinner's heart against God can be broken. When man becomes at peace with God, peace with his brother, of whatever race, social standing or other distinctive, becomes an imperative not a nice suggestion.
Dylan needs to compose a new song, something more on the line of "come on people, let's smile on our brother..." The Youngbloods, for all their faults, were closer to the truth than he.
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