adjective "Christian" [but WOT-WG]

[Wilson Gray]

Back in the day, I used to have as a colleague one "Dave." He and I
got along quite well. Given that this was the mid-'Fifties and that
Dave was white guy in his sixties, whereas I was a black kid in his
teens, socially, he was a far-left-wing liberal. When one of our
bosses angered him, he turned to the Bible for sustenance, using the
Old-testament bit about "an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth"
as the basis of his fantasies of avenging himself against the
offending superior.

Finally, one day, as Dave began one his rants - "You know what the
Bible says, etc." - I said to him, "Dave, the Bible also says,
"Vengeance is *mine*, sayeth the Lord. *I* shall repay."

Dave was stunned, looking at me as though I had lost my mind.
Finally, he was able to blurt out, "But, but, that's in the NEW
Testament!"

Correct me if I'm wrong, but I've always thought that belief in the
New Testament was one of the things that made Christians Christians,
whatever their denomination.

FTR, I'm a no-longer-practicing, Jesuit-educated adherent of The One
True Faith, i.e. Catholicism. (Lest anyone misunderstand, I use the
phrase, "The One True Faith," facetiously. It is/was? a Jesuitic
cliche.) I converted as a child as soon as I became aware of the fact
that one can hear Mass in as few as fifteen minutes, one day a week
as opposed to the Protestant regimen of five hours of Sunday services
and four more hours during the rest of the week. And we weren't even
Baptists, just Methodists.

-Wilson

>---------------------- Information from the mail header
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>Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
>Poster:       "Baker, John" <JMB at STRADLEY.COM>
>Subject:      Re: adjective "Christian"
>-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
>         The reference is to Proverbs 13:24, which in the King James
>Version reads "He that spareth his rod hateth his son: but he that
>loveth him chasteneth him betimes."  Note that, as so often is the
>case, personal selectivity and interpretation matter a great deal.
>McConnell could have interpreted the verse as simply urging
>punishment and discipline, without being specific as to the manner
>of the punishment.  He could also have emphasized the New Testament
>teachings of Jesus, which typically mitigate the severity of the Old
>Testament teachings.  An example would be "He that is without sin
>among you, let him first cast a stone at her."  (John 8:7)  That
>McConnell chose instead to advocate beating the children in his care
>was the result of his own choices, not just a neutral reading of the
>Bible.
>
>John Baker
>
>
>-----Original Message-----
>From: American Dialect Society [mailto:ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU]On Behalf
>Of Arnold M. Zwicky
>Sent: Monday, March 14, 2005 1:27 PM
>To: ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU
>Subject: adjective "Christian"
>
>
>from the NYT, 3/10/05, p. A22, "Favor the Rod, Get the Ax" (with
>subhead: "College Expels Education Student Who Advocated Corporal
>Punishment"), by Patrick D. Healy:
>
>The profanity transported him [Scott McConnell, the education student
>in question] back to his own days at Robert E. Lee Elementary School in
>Oklahoma in the 1980's, when there was a swift solution for wiseacres:
>The paddle.
>
>"It was a footlong piece of wood, and hung on every classroom wall like
>a symbol, a strong Christian symbol," said Mr. McConnell, who is 26.
>-----
>
>i'm struggling to see how a paddle used for punishment serves as a
>Christian symbol.  what's the interpretation of "Christian" here?
>
>arnold (zwicky at csli.stanford.edu)