There has been much written, spoken and hotly debated recently regarding “white privilege.” As the protests over the unjustified murders of our black brothers and sisters have grown and spread, I have written elsewhere about how they have sparked heightened personal discernment and I remain prayerfully encouraged that there is more to this than activist chic. Yet with the ying comes the yang and there is angry backlash from those who refuse to understand the bigger picture of white privilege. White privilege is not a statement about work ethic or lack thereof. Nor is a statement that refers to being born with a silver spoon in your mouth. White privilege doesn’t mean that your life hasn’t been hard: it means that your skin color is not making it harder. It is a comprehensive statement of the overt and covert ways that a Caucasian ethnicity has been manipulated to create advantages in our society that others do not enjoy, and in so doing, has created and perpetuated a severe socio-economic divide that marginalizes and dehumanizes people of color. In other words, white privilege is a metaphor for the systemic racism that benefits the powerful. That is anathema to Christ’s commands to love God and neighbor.
In an earlier post (see Peace, Peace), I have called out the church’s silence on the hypocritical behavior of a large number of white, evangelicals for their support for a politician who is all about maintaining white, patriarchal, misogynistic privilege. In this post, I want to take a look at what white privilege looks like through a biblical lens and I found Jeremiah to have much to say on this topic.
As with Amos and Hosea, Jeremiah’s oracles condemning social injustice and hypocritical religious practices by the temple leadership that undergird said injustices, are as persuasive, urgent and timely today as they were 2,600 years ago. The fabric of our social structures are frayed to the point where questioning their survival is a legitimate concern. The ‘gaslighting’[1] war on truth that has erupted, seeks to manipulate and control the populace in ways that promote surrender and acquiescence to conditions that serve, not our society or country, but the vanity and rapacious greed of certain centers of the power elite. The continual drumbeat of ethnocentric fear is merely another symptom of a society whose leadership, both sacred and secular, has engaged in marked indifference for the weak, the powerless and the marginalized, condemning far too many to the trash heap of neglect.
It is from this context that Jeremiah’s words in 5.26-31 caused me to sit up and take notice, as the old saw goes. The thematic elements of the two poems that I see contained therein have resonated deeply with me for some time. In this time of deep social unrest and protest, they do so now with graver interest and heightened concern. White privilege.
The Text
For scoundrels are found among my people; they take over the goods of others. Like fowlers they set a trap; they catch human beings. Like a cage full of birds, their houses are full of treachery; therefore they have become great and rich, they have grown fat and sleek. They know no limits in deeds of wickedness; they do not judge with justice the cause of the orphan, to make it prosper, and they do not defend the rights of the needy. Shall I not punish them for these things? says the Lord, and shall I not bring retribution on a nation such as this? An appalling and horrible thing has happened in the land: the prophets prophesy falsely, and the priests rule as the prophets direct; my people love to have it so, but what will you do when the end comes? (NRSV)
Let’s do a little exegetical spelunking that will deepen our appreciation for what it is that God is saying to Jeremiah.
One of the understated beautiful elements in the books of the prophets is the poetic language used by God and we see that clearly in the passage above. Actually, the verses here are part of a larger, three poem movement that begins in 5.20 on the peoples perversity. I have chosen to focus on the last two poetic movements: the people’s injustice in verses 5.26-29 and finally, the people’s leaders in verses 5.30-31.
In verses 26-31, God is speaking, concluding a longer speech in which he exhorted Jeremiah to declare to the house of Jacob a prophecy warning the foolish, rebellious and complacent people that their rejection and lack of reverence of him would be their doom. The text at hand is an expression of a number of specific evils that were characteristics of the people’s rejection; a state of affairs and blatant covenantal breach that God could not ignore. The final poetic speech condemns the leaders of the people for also falling victim to the corruption that marked the ethos of the age. As we parse things further in our exegetical digging, there are eight couplets that makes this very clear.
- 26 For scoundrels are found among my people; they take over the goods of others.
- Like fowlers they set a trap; they catch human beings.
- 27 Like a cage full of birds, their houses are full of treachery; therefore they have become great and rich,
- 28 they have grown fat and sleek. They know no limits in deeds of wickedness;
- they do not judge with justice the cause of the orphan, to make it prosper, and they do not defend the rights of the needy.
- 29 Shall I not punish them for these things? says the Lord, and shall I not bring retribution on a nation such as this?
- 30 An appalling and horrible thing has happened in the land: 31the prophets prophesy falsely,
- and the priests rule as the prophets direct; my people love to have it so, but what will you do when the end comes?
The unity of the poems is accomplished through the theme ‘people’ around the central thread of social injustice. In verses 26-28, the people are ‘scoundrels’ that act deceitfully, entrapping other people through their fraud and deceit. Their homes are filled by the theft of others goods and services that accrues to their selfish benefit. They have perverted justice to serve their own ends at the expense of the poor and the weak. This is the evil and injustice that has invited judgment by the Lord.
Verses 30-31 declares that even the spiritual leaders are guilty of the same corruption. Instead of speaking the divine word, the prophets spoke their own babble; a self-serving discourse that comforted the power elite and further marginalized those outside. Their great evil was the prophetic perversion of the truth to such a degree that the people loved the miserable conditions to which their broken society had sunk. There was great comfort in not being condemned from the pulpit. Finally, when this era of evil has been rendered to the dustbin by the Lord, an entire nation would have to face the consequences of building a way of life on avarice and greed.
There is something jarring about the imagery elicited by the words ‘fat and sleek’ in verse 28, as on the surface, they describe seemingly opposing conditions. Upon a little closer examination, we find a compelling picture of the condition of the power elite that God is painting. Merriam-Webster lists three categories of definitions for fat: 1) notable for having an unusual amount of it, that is plump, well-filled out, oily, greasy matter; 2) as a verb, to make fat; 3) animal tissue, the best or richest part, something in excess. Sleek is defined as a transitive verb to cover up, to gloss over and as adjective to mean smooth or glossy as if polished, having graceful lines, and also as having a prosperous air. [2] The scoundrels have bulked up, greasy, corpulent people fattened by their theft and greed, that may have a prosperous (pompous?) air, but their polished, glossy surface is a veneer that reflects back to all, especially to the Lord, the results of their evil ways.
The clear and flagrant defiance of God and revolt against the covenant by the evil doers makes his rhetorical question in verse 29 seem almost akin to our common expression of ‘Really?’ when confronted with the obvious attempt at subterfuge or behavior so blatantly foolish.
The unjust actions of the people are captured well with the simile of the fowler. Bird hunters of the time would use a hidden net and the hunters would also hide, waiting for a signal from a watcher to release the net and ensnare the prey. God has invoked powerful imagery that well illustrates the depravity of those condemned. Like a fowler, the scoundrels deliberately planned their evil work, secreting themselves in ways to trap and exploit the weak for their own gain. Like a fowler returning home with a cage full of birds, the people filled their mansions and bank accounts with the fruit of their theft: the rich got richer at the expense of the poor and the weak.
There is a metaphorical hint in play, I think as well, as the law courts should have been the domain for integrity, checking rapacious greed. In verse 28, we see that the scoundrels “know no limits in deeds and wickedness; they do not judge with justice the cause of the orphan, to make it prosper, and they do not defend the rights of the needy.” The orphan is a traditional symbol of God’s concern for the weak, the poor and vulnerable who were without influence and power. Their condition should have been upheld and defended with justice, yet the perversity of the land was so great that even these bastions of relief are corrupted by the rich and the powerful so as to serve the their own ends to the disadvantage of the poor.
The Nature of Power
There is an obvious power of the corrupt on display with their exploitation of the poor and the weak. Yet, the word of the Lord is where the real power rests as Jeremiah had been summoned to “Declare this in the house of Jacob, to proclaim it in Judah …Shall I not punish them for these things?” [3] Perhaps less noticed is that word of the Lord has conceivably stripped the people of their status as the chosen ones of God. The Hebrew translated as ‘on a nation’ in verse 29b is begow, from the root goy, meaning a gentile people or nation. By their deceit and evil, God has declared the wicked as unholy and unworthy of being his people. That is a powerful condemnation of those who have been deceptively paying lip service to God all the while making a mockery of their activities with their unjust and evil doings. White privilege.
The Heart of God
The biblical witness is replete with testimony to God’s love, patience and care for his chosen people:
And the LORD came down in the cloud and stationed Himself with him there, and He invoked the name of the LORD. And the LORD passed before him and He called out: “The LORD, The LORD a compassionate and gracious God, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast kindness and good faith, keeping kindness for the thousandth generation, bearing crime, trespass, and offense, yet He does not wholly acquit, reckoning the crime of the fathers with sons and sons of sons, to the third generation and the fourth.” [4]
Chapter five of Jeremiah begins within that same framework with the opening echoes of Abraham’s questioning God in Genesis 18 over whether Sodom can spared if ten just men can be found in it. God is far more generous here and would spare Jerusalem if one just person could be unearthed. [5]
God cares greatly for his flock and in spite of the wide scale rejection and depravity that he is encountering, God still bears his heart and shows his love and concern when in verse 26, he proclaims: “For scoundrels are found among My people” (emphasis mine). God laments the injustices heaped upon his people, those God has commanded to be cared for, the powerless members of society who are vulnerable to exploitation. The biblical witness is abounding in examples with how dear these groups are to God. [6] One illustration: “No widow or orphan shall you abuse. If you indeed abuse them, when they cry out to Me, I will surely hear their outcry. And My wrath shall flare up and I will kill you by the sword.” [7] In the text at hand, God shows his disgust and anger at those that are in a position to effect justice and restoration, but chose to line their own pockets instead. From verse 28: “They know no limits in deeds of wickedness; they do not judge with justice the cause of the orphan, to make it prosper, and they do not defend the rights of the needy.” That is righteous wrath about white privilege then and it is righteous wrath that can be levied on white privilege today.
Adding fuel to the fire, God is wrestling with the ethos of deceit and betrayal that has become so rampant that the nevi’im (prophets) and kohaním (priests), with their false teachings and the lies that supported them, have colluded in its promotion. White privilege. The people have willingly embraced the fabrications of the leaders and sunk to depths of depravity that they actually enjoy and celebrate. White privilege.
God, as any loving parent must do when faced with little choice, wrestles with the agony of being forced to bring discipline to his wayward children. “He can no more forgive, He must avenge himself, He has been deceived, offended, betrayed: it is His own possession, with which he must part.” [8] God’s pain is palpable, his torment perceptible, his care for his people tangible.
White privilege. “When a culture begins to feel threatened by its own inadequacies, the majority of men (sic) tend to prop themselves up by artificial means, rather than dig down deep into their spiritual and cultural wellsprings. America seems to have reached that point.” [9] Indeed. When the Roman empire began to disintegrate, it turned to an increasing reliance upon a military establishment rather than correcting the corruption that was rampant within it. Vicious dogs and ominous weapons. I think we know how that turned out: let us learn from history to not repeat that mistake because there is hope for us if we listen and turn around.
We live in a time when Jeremiah speaks loud truths from the ancient past. The parallels with our politicians and administration and society at large are frightening. As Christians, we are called upon to engage in kingdom work and that means tackling the problems that we face with humility, justice and love. It is caring for the sick, the orphan, the disenfranchised and working to eliminate the systems and nonfreedoms which cause the afflictions we now face. Basic civil rights and political freedoms are essential ingredients that produce our social values and that can only occur when there is freedom to participate at all levels. White privilege is a metaphor for limitation. As one observer noted, it is as if we started playing a game of Monopoly and kept non-Caucasians from the game until it had been underway for several days. The choice of social values cannot be made by an autocratic few – that’s why we threw tea into Boston Harbor. White privilege is all about maintaining that autocratic system; a system that flies in the face of loving our neighbor. It must be brought down. Let us pray that Jeremiah’s indictment of the Jerusalem elite then and the white privilege of today, does not continue to fall on deaf ears. “What will you do when the end comes?” Let our answer be to engage the systemic change the gospel of Christ calls for and may it be within every fiber of every soul and across every corner of this country.
[1] This term comes from the 1938 stage play Gas Light, in which a husband attempts to drive his wife crazy by dimming the lights (which were powered by gas) in their home, and then he denies that the light changed when his wife points it out. It is an extremely effective form of emotional abuse that causes a victim to question their own feelings, instincts, and sanity, which gives the abusive partner a lot of power (and we know that abuse is about power and control). Once an abusive partner has broken down the victim’s ability to trust their own perceptions, the victim is more likely to stay in the abusive relationship. “National Domestic Hotline – What Is Gaslighting?,” The National Domestic Violence Hotline, accessed December 13, 2018, https://www.thehotline.org/.
[2] “Merriam-Webster Dictionary,” Merriam-Webster.com, accessed December 21, 2018, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/fat.
[3] Jeremiah 5.20, 29, NRSV.
[4] Exodus 34. 6-8, Robert Alter, ed., The Hebrew Bible: A Translation with Commentary, trans. Robert Alter, First edition (New York ; London: W. W. Norton & Company, 2018), Vol. I, The Five Books of Moses, 349.
[5] “Search its squares and see if you can find one person who acts justly and seeks truth- so that I may pardon Jerusalem.” Jeremiah 5.1, NRSV.
[6] E.g. see Job 29.12, 31.16-18; Psalms 10.14 68.5, 82.3, 146.9; Isaiah 58.7.
[7] Exodus 22.22-23, Alter, The Hebrew Bible, Vol 1, The Five Books of Moses, 307.
[8] Abraham Joshua Heschel, The Prophets: Two Volumes in One, 1. Hendrickson Publ. print (Peabody, Mass: Hendrickson, 2007), Vol. 1, 109. citing P. Volz, Der Prophet Jeremia (Leipzig, 1922), p 60 from the translation of same by E.A Leslie, Jeremiah (New York, 1954), 60.
[9] “A Testament of Hope” A Posthumously published essay Martin Luther King, A Testament of Hope: The Essential Writings and Speeches of Martin Luther King, Jr, ed. James Melvin Washington, 1st HarperCollins pbk. ed (San Francisco: HarperSanFrancisco, 1991), 323.
