“Abner called out to Joab, “Must the sword devour forever? Don’t you realize that this will end in bitterness?””
I am struggling!
George Floyd’s life snuffed out under the knee of an officer sworn to protect and serve. Horrible. Inexcusable.
Grief and pain of black Americans living under the shadow of injustice.
Hideous. Prejudiced.Peaceful protests as an expression of outrage and “Enough is enough!”
Understandable. Necessary.Riots, vitriol, destruction, and vandalism as emotional outlets.
Sad. Frustrating.
The move from peaceful protests to violence and looting is depressing. Still, should I expect a boiling pot to cool when the flame of injustice is still lit? I look around Lancaster City . . . many cities, and I have my answer. This is not going away.
So what to do? Today, I’m taking my cue from Hannah.
Hannah was Thomas Jefferson’s enslaved cook. The same Mr. Jefferson who paved the runway of American freedom with poetry from heaven:
We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.
Jefferson might as well have written “all white men are created equal.” The Declaration’s author was steeped in a world of white class and privilege; a world that viewed blacks as inferior, ignorant, and subservient.
To understand Jefferson and his times, look to Monticello and his other properties. “Thomas Jefferson enslaved over 600 human beings throughout the course of his life.” He bought them. He sold them. Slaves built his two great monuments: Monticello and the University of Virginia.
Jefferson, like many of his contemporaries, believed slavery was a necessary evil; essential for economic survival in his beloved Virginia. He talked and wrote extensively about freeing slaves, but the man with the greatest clout in the Union, “preferred to wait for some future day to act against slavery.”
When Edward Coles pleaded for Jefferson’s help to free slaves, Jefferson replied by writing:
Yet the hour of emancipation is advancing in the march of time. It will come; and whether brought on by the generous energy of our own minds, or by the bloody process of St. Domingo, . . . is a leaf of our history not yet turned over.
As Pulitzer-Prize winning author Alan Taylor notes, “By asserting future inevitability, Jefferson justified present passivity.”
I don’t want to sooth myself with Jeffersonian thoughts of inevitability, or live with a “Jeffersonian passivity.”
What to do?
I went to bed last night with Abner’s question on my mind. When I awoke it was still there:
“Will the sword devour forever?”
Right now that sword is cutting a swath of ruin and destruction across our country. And once sheathed, how long before the next victim of brutality brings it out again? The end is certainly more destruction.
Again, what to do? I come back to Hannah.
In 1818, Hannah, the enslaved cook at Jefferson’s Poplar Forest estate, gently lectured her master, then at Monticello, by letter. Learning of his serious illness, she exhorted Jefferson to find Jesus before it was too late for his soul: “We ought to serve and obey his commandments that you may set to win the prize and after glory run.” Hannah felt sure that she knew the most important thing in life and that her master did not. That knowledge gave her the confidence to instruct Jefferson.
If anyone was in a powerless position, it was Hannah. She was black. She was a slave. She was a woman. Hannah was the image of impotence. However, unlike her master, Hannah knew The Master. So refusing Jefferson’s empty promise of inevitability and determined not to cave in to sloven passivity, she took a risk. She picked up her pen. She wrote a note. She pointed Jefferson to Jesus.
“We ought to serve and obey his commandments.”
Thank you Hannah for reminding me of the most important thing: Look to Jesus. Act in love! For certainly to “serve and obey his commandments” is to do just that.
I am grateful to be a part of an institution that equips people to look to Jesus and act in love. On the heels of earlier racial tension in our country LBC | Capital published a statement on racial reconciliation that includes these words:
Lancaster Bible College | Capital Seminary and Graduate School condemns racism in all forms, and we firmly believe that racial reconciliation is a critical ministry of the Church. We believe that God created all persons and that, in the greatest commandment, Jesus taught us to love our neighbor as ourselves.
Of course, statements must be followed by steps.
To love is to listen, to lend a hand, to stand with, and to stand up for the oppressed. It is also to stand against injustice in all forms. Hannah started with a letter and resolve.
Today is fresh opportunity to look to Jesus and act in love. Lord, help me to be a Hannah.
Notes:
“Thomas Jefferson enslaved over 600 human beings throughout the course of his life.” from “Slavery FAQ’s - Property” at www.monticello.org. Accessed June 1, 2020
Jefferson “preferred to wait for some future day to act against slavery.” from Alan Taylor, Thomas Jefferson’s Education. New York: W.W. Norton & Company, Inc. 2019. Page 149.
“Yet the hour of emancipation is advancing . . .” Ibid.
“By asserting future inevitability . . .” Ibid.
Hannah gently lectured her master from Thomas Jefferson’s Education, page 156.