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Jesus would not appeal to the Moral Majority
Sydney Harris
One of the rich ironies of the so-called "fundamentalist" movement is that while it preaches Christ, it forgets Jesus.
For the fact is that the living Jesus would not be an appealing figure to the members of the Moral Majority. For the fact further is that he was a thorn in the side of the fundamentalists of his own time.
Jesus wanted to reform and humanize the religion of his time and his church. He saw it falling into the hands of the legalists and the narrow moralists. He saw it as becoming proud and priggish and punitive--when it should be humble and compassionate and forgiving.
The fundamentalists of his church reviled and condemned him for his actions, his attitudes and his sayings. He associated with prostitutes and tavern- keepers and tax collectors. He mingled with the riff-raff not with the respectable members of the clergy.
He was a revolutionary in a moral, not in a political sense. He reminded us that the Sabbath was made for man, not man for the Sabbath--which means that what is "right" or "wrong" to do depends on the human end, not on the legal code or ecclesiastical edict.
He was strict about the way we ought to behave toward one another, but lenient toward our personal weaknesses. He warned the self-righteous to, "Judge not that ye be not judged." He preferred the poor, the outcast, the struggling, often the "sinner" to the pious, respectable, hypocritical upholders of the law and trustees of the temple.
This is why they hated him and hounded him. Because he saw that religion had hardened into ritual, that the early faith of the fathers had turned cold and formal and self-righteous, that the zeal of the prophets had been replaced by the dogmas of the priests.
You cannot read the New Testament without realizing that Jesus was irrevocably opposed to the Moral Majority of his time. His mission was to revitalize and re-humanize the Jewish church, to reawaken its early passion against injustice and oppression.
His idea of "morality" had nothing to do with gambling or drinking wine or such frailties. His idea was truly "fundamental" in that it went right to the bottom of men's relations with one another--in terms of brotherliness, tolerance, help, mercy.
His parable of the good Samaritan was shocking and revolting to the Moral Majority of his day--for he showed how the priests and the pious passed by a fallen man, while the despised Samaritan was the only one who tried to work God's will.
Whatever the modern fundamentalist claims to be, in the name of Christ, he is taking the name of Jesus in vain. For Jesus was not setting up a church, or establishing rules, or condemning his brothers. He was showing us how God wants us to act toward one another, by his own example. It is a lesson the fundamentalists still have to learn.
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