Military chaplains use it to encourage the South African Defence Force , police chaplains use it to strengthen policemen and cabinet ministers use it in their propaganda speeches. In humble submission to Almighty God, who controls the destinies of nations and the history of peoples; who gathered our forebears together from many lands and gave them this their own; who has guided them from generation to generation; who has wondrously delivered them from the dangers that beset them.
This god is an idol. It is as mischievous, sinister and evil as any of the idols that the prophets of Israel had to contend with. It is the god of superior weapons who conquered those who were armed with nothing but spears. It is the god of the casspirs and hippos, the god of teargas, rubber bullets, sjamboks, prison cells and death sentences. From a theological point of view the opposite of the God of the Bible is the devil, Satan. The god of the South African State is not merely an idol or false god, it is the devil disguised as Almighty God—the antichrist. The oppressive South African regime will always be particularly abhorrent to Christians precisely because it makes use of Christianity to justify its evil ways.
Christians who are trying to remain faithful to the God of the Bible are even more horrified when they see that there are Churches, like the White Dutch Reformed Churches and other groups of Christians, who actually subscribe to this heretical theology. What is particularly tragic for a Christian is to see the number of people who are fooled and confused by these false prophets and their heretical theology. We have looked at what Church leaders tend to say in their speeches and press statements about the apartheid regime and the present crisis.
What we found running through all these pronouncements is a series of inter-related theological assumptions. Nevertheless the opinions expressed by Church leaders are regarded in the media and generally in our society as the official opinions of the Churches. In a limited, guarded and cautious way this theology is critical of apartheid. Its criticism, however, is superficial and counter-productive because instead of engaging in an in-depth analysis of the signs of our times, it relies upon a few stock ideas derived from Christian tradition and then uncritically and repeatedly applies them to our situation.
The stock ideas used by almost all these Church leaders that we would like to examine here are: It talks about the need for reconciliation between white and black, or between all South Africans. We must listen to both sides of the story.
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If the two sides can only meet to talk and negotiate they will sort out their differences and misunderstandings, and the conflict will be resolved. But not all cases of conflict are the same. We can imagine a private quarrel between two people or two groups whose differences are based upon misunderstandings. In such cases it would be appropriate to talk and negotiate to sort out the misunderstandings and to reconcile the two sides.
But there are other conflicts in which one side is right and the other wrong. There are conflicts where one side is a fully armed and violent oppressor while the other side is defenseless and oppressed. There are conflicts that can only be described as the struggle between justice and injustice, good and evil, God and the devil. To speak of reconciling these two is not only a mistaken application of the Christian idea of reconciliation, it is a total betrayal of all that Christian faith has ever meant.
Nowhere in the Bible or in Christian tradition has it ever been suggested that we ought to try to reconcile good and evil, God and the devil. We are supposed to do away with evil, injustice, oppression and sin—not come to terms with it. We are supposed to oppose, confront and reject the devil and not try to sup with the devil. In our situation in South Africa today it would be totally unChristian to plead for reconciliation and peace before the present injustices have been removed. Any such plea plays into the hands of the oppressor by trying to persuade those of us who are oppressed to accept our oppression and to become reconciled to the intolerable crimes that are committed against us.
That is not Christian reconciliation, it is sin.
It is asking us to become accomplices in our own oppression, to become servants of the devil. No reconciliation is possible in South Africa without justice. What this means in practice is that no reconciliation, no forgiveness and no negotiations are possible without repentance. The Biblical teaching on reconciliation and forgiveness makes it quite clear that nobody can be forgiven and reconciled with God unless he or she repents of their sins. Nor are we expected to forgive the unrepentant sinner. When he or she repents we must be willing to forgive seventy times seven times but before that, we are expected to preach repentance to those who sin against us or against anyone.
Reconciliation, forgiveness and negotiations will become our Christian duty in South Africa only when the apartheid regime shows signs of genuine repentance. The recent speech of PW Botha in Durban, the continued military repression of the people in the townships and the jailing of all its opponents is clear proof of the total lack of repentance on the part of the present regime.
There is nothing that we want more than true reconciliation and genuine peace—the peace that God wants and not the peace the world wants Jn The peace that God wants is based upon truth, repentance, justice and love. The peace that the world offers us is a unity that compromises the truth, covers over injustice and oppression and is totally motivated by selfishness. At this stage, like Jesus, we must expose this false peace, confront our oppressors and sow dissension. As Christians we must say with Jesus: There can be no real peace without justice and repentance.
As disciples of Jesus we should rather promote truth and justice and life at all costs, even at the cost of creating conflict, disunity and dissension along the way. To be truly biblical our Church leaders must adopt a theology that millions of Christians have already adopted-a biblical theology of direct confrontation with the forces of evil, rather than a theology of reconciliation with sin and the devil. There have been some very strong and very sincere demands for justice.
But the question we need to ask here, the very serious theological question is: What kind of justice? An examination of Church statements and pronouncements gives the distinct impression that the justice that is envisaged is the justice of reform , that is to say, a justice that is determined by the oppressor, by the white minority and that is offered to the people as a kind of concession. It does not appear to be the more radical justice that comes from below and is determined by the people of South Africa. One of our main reasons for drawing this conclusion is the simple fact that almost all Church statements and appeals are made to the State or to the white community.
The assumption seems to be that changes must come from whites or at least from people who are at the top of the pile. The general idea appears to be that one must simply appeal to the conscience and the goodwill of those who are responsible for injustice in our land and that once they have repented of their sins and after some consultation with others they will introduce the necessary reforms to the system. Why else would Church leaders be having talks with PW Botha , if this is not the vision of a just and peaceful solution to our problems?
It has not worked and it never will work. The problem that we are dealing with here in South Africa is not merely a problem of personal guilt, it is a problem of structural injustice. People are suffering, people are being maimed and killed and tortured every day. We cannot just sit back and wait for the oppressor to see the light so that the oppressed can put out their hands and beg for the crumbs of some small reforms.
That in itself would be degrading and oppressive. There have been reforms and, no doubt, there will be further reforms in the near future. But can such reforms ever be regarded as real change, as the introduction of a true and lasting justice. Reforms that come from the top are never satisfactory. They seldom do more than make the oppression more effective and more acceptable. If the oppressor does ever introduce reforms that might lead to real change this will come about because of strong pressure from those who are oppressed. This can only come from below, from the oppressed themselves.
God will bring about change through the oppressed as he did through the oppressed Hebrew slaves in Egypt. Why does this theology not demand that the oppressed stand up for their rights and wage a struggle against their oppressors? Why does it not tell them that it is their duty to work for justice and to change the unjust structures?
An appeal to the conscience of those who perpetuate the system of injustice must be made. But real change and true justice can only come from below, from the people—most of whom are Christians. Here again non-violence has been made into an absolute principle that applies to anything anyone calls violence without regard for who is using it, which side they are on or what purpose they may have in mind. In our situation, this is simply counter-productive. The problem for the Church here is the way the word violence is being used in the propaganda of the State.
The State and the media have chosen to call violence what some people do in the townships as they struggle for their liberation i. But this excludes the structural, institutional and unrepentant violence of the State and especially the oppressive and naked violence of the police and the army. These things are not counted as violence. If one calls for nonviolence in such circumstances one appears to be criticizing the resistance of the people while justifying or at least overlooking the violence of the police and the State.
That is how it is understood not only by the State and its supporters but also by the people who are struggling for their freedom. Violence, especially in our circumstances, is a loaded word. It is true that Church statements and pronouncements do also condemn the violence of the police.
They do say that they condemn all violence. But is it legitimate, especially in our circumstances, to use the same word violence in a blanket condemnation to cover the ruthless and repressive activities of the State and the desperate attempts of the people to defend themselves? Do such abstractions and generalizations not confuse the issue?
How can acts of oppression, injustice and domination be equated with acts of resistance and self-defense? Would it be legitimate to describe both the physical force used by a rapist and the physical force used by a woman trying to resist the rapist as violence? Moreover there is nothing in the Bible or in our Christian tradition that would permit us to make such generalizations. Throughout the Bible the word violence is used to describe everything that is done by a wicked oppressor e.
When Jesus says that we should turn the other cheek he is telling us that we must not take revenge; he is not saying that we should never defend ourselves or others. There is a long and consistent Christian tradition about the use of physical force to defend oneself against aggressors and tyrants. In other words there are circumstances when physical force may be used.
This is not to say that any use of force at any time by people who are oppressed is permissible simply because they are struggling for their liberation. There have been cases of killing and maiming that no Christian would want to approve of. But then our disapproval is based upon a concern for genuine liberation and a conviction that such acts are unnecessary, counter-productive and unjustifiable and not because they fall under a blanket condemnation of any use of physical force in any circumstance.
How can one condemn all violence and then appoint chaplains to a very violent an oppressive army? How can one condemn all violence and then allow young whit males to accept their conscription into the armed forces? Is it because the activities of the armed forces and the police are counted as defensive?
That raises very serious questions about whose side such Church leaders might be on. Why are the activities of young blacks in the townships not regarded as defensive? The attempt to remain neutral in this kind of conflict is futile. Neutrality enables the status quo o oppression and therefore violence to continue. It is a way of giving tacit support to the oppressor. What is behind the mistakes and misunderstandings and inadequacies of this theology? In the first place we can point to a lack of social analysis. Very little attempt is made to analyze what is actually happening it our society and why it is happening.
It is not possible to make valid moral judgment: The present crisis has now made ii very clear that the efforts of Church leaders to promote effective and practical ways o: Changing the structures of a society is fundamentally a matter of politics. It requires a political strategy based upon a clear social or political analysis. The Church has to address itself to these strategies and to the analysis upon which they are based. It is into this political situation that the Church has to bring the gospel.
Not as an alternative solution to our problems as if the gospel provided us with a non-political solution to political problems. There is no specifically Christian solution. There will be a Christian way of approaching the political solutions, a Christian spirit and motivation and attitude. But there is no way of bypassing politics and political strategies. But we have still not pinpointed the fundamental problem.
Why does it have an inadequate understanding of the need for political strategies? And why does it make a virtue of neutrality and sitting on the sidelines? The answer must be sought in the type of faith and spirituality that has dominated Church life for centuries. As we all know, spirituality has tended to be an other-worldly affair that has very little, if anything at all, to do with the affairs of this world. Social and political matters were seen as worldly affairs that have nothing to do with the spiritual concerns of the Church.
Moreover, spirituality has also been understood to be purely private and individualistic. Public affairs and social problems were thought to be beyond the sphere of spirituality. And finally the spirituality we inherit tends to rely upon God to intervene in his own good time to put right what is wrong in the world. It is precisely this kind of spirituality that, when faced with the present crisis in South Africa, leaves so many Christians and Church leaders in a state of near paralysis. It hardly needs saying that this kind of faith and this type of spirituality has no biblical foundation.
God redeems the whole person as part of his whole creation Rom 8: Biblical faith is prophetically relevant to everything that happens in the world. Towards a Prophetic Theology. It is not enough in these circumstances to repeat generalized Christian principles. We need a bold and incisive response that is prophetic because it speaks to the particular circumstances of this crisis, a response that does not give the impression of sitting on the fence but is clearly and unambiguously taking a stand.
It is not possible to do this in any detail in the document but we must start with at least the broad outlines of an analysis of the conflict in which we find ourselves. It would be quite wrong to see the present conflict as simply a racial war. The racial component is there but we are not dealing with two equal races or nations each with their own selfish group interests. The situation we are dealing with here is one of oppression.
The conflict is between an oppressor and the oppressed. The conflict between two irreconcilable causes or interests in which the one is just and the other is unjust. On the one hand we have the interests of those who benefit from the status quo and who are determined to maintain it at any cost, even at the cost of millions of lives. It is in their interests to introduce a number of reforms in order to ensure that the system is not radically changed and that thy can continue to benefit from the system because it favors them and enables them to accumulate a great deal of wealth and to maintain an exceptionally high standard of living.
And thy want to made sure that it stays that way even if some adjustments are needed. On the other hand we have those who do not benefit in any way from the system the way it is now. They are treated as mere labor units, paid starvation wages, separated from their families by migratory labor, moved about like cattle and dumped in homelands to starve—and all for the benefit of a privileged minority.
They have no say in the system and are supposed to by grateful for the concessions that are offered to them like crumbs. They are determined to change the system radically so that it not longer benefits only the privileged few. And they are willing to do this even at the cost of their own lives.
What they want is justice for all. This is our situation of civil war or revolution. The one side is committed to maintaining the system at all costs and the other side is committed to changing it at all coasts. There are two conflicting projects here and no compromise is possible.
The Bible has a great deal to say about this kind of conflict, about a world that is divided into oppressors and oppressed. When we search the Bible to a message about oppression we discover, as others throughout the world are discovering, that oppression is a central theme that runs right through the Old and New Testaments. The biblical scholars who have taken the trouble to study the theme of oppression in the Bible have discovered that there are no less than twenty different root words in Hebrew to describe oppression. Moreover the description of oppression in the Bible is concrete and vivid.
The Bible describes oppression as the experience of being crushed, degraded, humiliated, exploited, impoverished, defrauded, deceived and enslaved. And the oppressors are described as cruel, ruthless, arrogant, greedy, violent and tyrannical and as the enemy. Such descriptions could only have been written originally by people who had had a long and painful experience of what it means to be oppressed. And indeed nearly 90 percent of the history of the Jewish and later the Christian people whose story is told in the Bible, is a history of domestic of international oppression.
Israel as a nation was built upon the painful experience of oppression and repression as slaves in Egypt. But what made all the difference for this particular group of oppressed people was the revelation of Yahweh. God revealed himself as Yahweh, the one who has compassion on those who suffer and who liberates them from their oppressors.
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I have heard their appeal to be free of their slave-drivers. I mean to deliver them out of the hands of the Egyptians…. The cry of the sons of Israel has come to me, and I have witnessed the way in which the Egyptians oppress them. Throughout the Bible God appears as the liberator of the oppressed.
He is not neutral. He does not attempt to reconcile Moses and Pharaoh, to reconcile the Hebrew slaves with their Egyptian oppressors or to reconcile the Jewish people with any of their late oppressors. Oppression is sin and it cannot be compromised with, it must be done away with. God takes sides with the oppressed. As we read in Psalm Nor is this identification with the oppressed confined to the Old Testament.
When Jesus stood up in the synagogue at Nazareth to announce his mission he made use of the words of Isaiah. There can be no doubt that Jesus is here taking up the cause of the poor and the oppressed. He has identified himself with their interests.
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Not that he is unconcerned about the rich and the oppressor. These he calls to repentance. The oppressed Christians of South Africa have known for a long time that they are united to Christ in their sufferings. By his own sufferings and his death on the cross he became a victim of oppression and violence.
He is with us in our oppression. According to this tradition once it is established beyond doubt that a particular ruler is a tyrant of that a particular regime is tyrannical, it forfeits the moral right to govern and the people acquire the right to resist and to find the means to protect their own interests against injustice and oppression. In other words a tyrannical regime has no moral legitimacy.
It may be the de facto government and it may even be recognized by other governments and therefore be the de iure or legal government. But if it is a tyrannical regime, it is, from a moral and theological point of view, illegitimate. There are indeed some differences of opinion in the Christian tradition about the means that might be used to replace a tyrant but there has not been any doubt about our Christian duty to refuse to co-operate with tyranny and to do whatever we can to remove it. Of course everything hinges on the definition of a tyrant.
At what point does a government become a tyrannical regime? The traditional Latin definition of a tyrant is hostis boni communis — an enemy of the common good. The purpose of all government is the promotion of what is called the common good of the people governed. To promote the common good is to govern in the interests of, and for the benefit of, all the people.
Many governments fail to do this at times. There might be this or that injustice done to some of the people. And such lapses would indeed have to be criticized. But occasional acts of injustice would not make a government into an enemy of the people, a tyrant. To be an enemy of the people a government would have to be hostile to the common good in principle. Such a government would be acting against the interests of the people as a whole and permanently. This would be clearest in cases where the very policy of a government is hostile towards the common good and where the government has a mandate to rule in the interests of some of the people rather than in the interests of all the people.
Such a government would be in principle irreformable. Any reform that it might try to introduce would not be calculated to serve the common good but to serve the interests of the minority from whom it received its mandate. A tyrannical regime cannot continue to rule for very long without becoming more and more violent. As the majority of the people begin to demand their rights and to put pressure on the tyrant, so will the tyrant resort more and more to desperate, cruel, gross and ruthless forms of tyranny and repression. The reign of a tyrant always ends up as a reign of terror.
It is inevitable because from the start the tyrant is an enemy of the common good. This account of what we mean by a tyrant or a tyrannical regime can best be summed up in the words of a well-known moral theologian: That leaves us with the question of whether the present government of South Africa is tyrannical or not? There can be no doubt what the majority of the people of South Africa think. For them the apartheid regime is indeed the enemy of the people and that is precisely what they call it: In the present crisis, more than before, the regime has lost any legitimacy that it might have had in the eyes of the people.
Are the people right or wrong? Apartheid is a system whereby a minority regime elected by one small section of the population is given an explicit mandate to govern in the interests of, and for the benefit of, the white community. Such a mandate or policy is by definition hostile to the common good of all the people. In fact because it tries to rule in the exclusive interests of whites and not in the interests of all, it ends up ruling in a way that is not even in the interests of those same whites.
It becomes an enemy of all the people. A reign of terror. This also means that the apartheid minority regime is irreformable. We cannot expect the apartheid regime to experience a conversion or change of heart and totally abandon the policy of apartheid. It has no mandate from its electorate to do so.
Any reforms or adjustments it might make would have to be done in the interests of who elected it. Individual members of the government could experience a real conversion and repent but, if they did, they would simply have to follow this through by leaving a regime that was elected and put into power precisely because of its policy of apartheid. And that is why we have reached the present impasse. Kairos was central to the Sophists , who stressed the rhetor's ability to adapt to and take advantage of changing, contingent circumstances. Kairos is also very important in Aristotle 's scheme of rhetoric.
Kairos is, for Aristotle, the time and space context in which the proof will be delivered. Kairos stands alongside other contextual elements of rhetoric: The Audience , which is the psychological and emotional makeup of those who will receive the proof; and To Prepon , which is the style with which the orator clothes the proof.
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In Ancient Greece, "kairos" was utilized by both of the two main schools of thought in the field of rhetoric. The competing schools were that of the Sophists , and that of their opposition, led by individuals such as Aristotle and Plato. Sophism approached rhetoric as an art form. Members of the school would travel around Greece teaching citizens about the art of rhetoric and successful discourse.
Kairos fits into the Sophistic scheme of rhetoric in conjunction with the ideas of prepon and dynaton. These two terms combined with kairos are their keys to successful rhetoric. As stated by Poulakos, Prepon deals with the notion that "what is said must conform to both audience and occasion. Kairos in the Sophistic context is based on the thought that speech must happen at a certain time in order for it to be most effective. If rhetoric is to be meaningful and successful, it must be presented at the right moment, or else it will not have the same impact on the members of the audience.
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Aristotle and his followers also discuss the importance of kairos in their teachings. In his Rhetoric , one of the ways that Aristotle uses the idea of kairos is in reference to the specificity of each rhetorical situation. Aristotle believed that each rhetorical situation was different, and therefore different rhetorical devices needed to be applied at that point in time. One of the most well known parts of Aristotle's Rhetoric is when he discusses the roles of pathos, ethos, and logos.
Aristotle ties kairos to these concepts, claiming that there are times in each rhetorical situation when one needs to be utilized over the others. Kairos has classically been defined as a concept that focused on "'the uniquely timely, the spontaneous, the radically particular. Kairos was said to piece together the dualistic ways of the entire universe. Empedocles was the philosopher who connect kairos to the principle of opposites and harmony.
It then became the principle of conflict and resolution and was thus inserted as a concept for rhetoric. In his article "Critical-Rhetorical Ethnography: Rethinking the Place and Process of Rhetoric," Aaron Hess submits a definition of kairos for the present day that bridges the two classical applications. According to Hess, kairos can either be understood as, "the decorum or propriety of any given moment and speech act, implying a reliance on the given or known" or as, "the opportune, spontaneous, or timely.
Furthermore, they encourage creativity, which is necessary to adapt to unforeseen obstacles and opinions that can alter the opportune or appropriate moment, i. Hess's conflicting perspective on kairos is exemplified by the disagreement between Lloyd F. Bitzer and Richard E. Vatz about the rhetorical situation. Bitzer argues that rhetorical situations exist independent of human perspective; a situation invites discourse. He discusses the feeling of a missed opportunity to speak kairos and the tendency to later create a speech in response to that unseized moment.
It is the rhetor's responsibility to give an event meaning through linguistic depiction. On one hand, Bitzer's argument supports Hess's claim that kairos is spontaneous, and one must be able to recognize the situation as opportune in order to take advantage of it. On the other hand, Vatz's idea that the rhetor is responsible reinforces Hess's suggestion of the need to be knowledgeable and involved in the surrounding environment in order to fully profit from the situation.
According to Bitzer, Kairos is composed of exigence, audience, and constraints. Exigence is the inherent pressure to do something about a situation immediately, with the action required depending on the situation. The audience are the listeners who the rhetor is attempting to persuade. Additionally, factors such as cultural background, previous social experiences, and current mood, can influence the capacity to see and understand the correct and opportune moment of action. There is no one word in today's English language that completely encompasses the definition of kairos, similar to that of Ethos , Logos , and Pathos.
In his article "The Ethics of Argument: Rereading Kairos and Making Sense in a Timely Fashion," Michael Harker says, "Like the 'points' on the rhetorical triangle, the meaning of kairos is not definitive but rather a starting point for grasping the whole of an argument. Various components of kairos are included in modern composition and have made profound effects on modern composition theory.
Kairos' purpose in modern rhetoric is mostly focused on the placement of logos, pathos, and ethos. Kairos is used as a "starting point" in modern rhetoric. Kelly Pender's article "'Kairos' and the Subject of Expressive Discourse" states the inclusion of kairos within discourse "would try to shift the focus of personal writing from the writer's experiences and emotions to a broader perspective that explicitly concentrates on the rhetorical situation In the New Testament , "kairos" means "the appointed time in the purpose of God," the time when God acts e.
Jesus makes a distinction in John 7: In the context, they can go to Jerusalem any time they wish. For him, the kairoi are those crises in history see Christian existentialism which create an opportunity for, and indeed demand, an existential decision by the human subject - the coming of Christ being the prime example compare Karl Barth 's use of Geschichte as opposed to Historie.
In the Kairos Document , an example of liberation theology in South Africa under apartheid , the term kairos is used to denote "the appointed time," "the crucial time" into which the document or text is spoken. Hippocrates is generally accepted as the father of medicine, but his contribution to the discourse of science is less discussed. In A Rhetoric of Doing: Citing John Swales , the essay notes that the introduction sections of scientific research articles are nothing more than the construction of openings.