Human Nature in its First Estate

Righteousness and Holiness

Professor: Dr. R.J. Rushdoony

Subject: Psychology

Genre: Lecture

Track: 06

Dictation Name: RR131C6

Location/Venue: ________

Year: 1960’s-1970’s.

Ephesians 4:21-24, righteousness and holiness.

21 Since you have heard about Jesus and have learned the truth that comes from him, 22 throw off your old sinful nature and your former way of life, which is corrupted by lust and deception. 23 Instead, let the Spirit renew your thoughts and attitudes. 24 Put on your new nature, created to be like God—truly righteous and holy.

In this passage Saint Paul speaks of the change which comes about with regeneration. And he declares that when we are converted by Christ we put off the old conversation or behavior, which belongs to the old fallen man, the corrupt man, and we are renewed and we put on the new man after God. The term “after God” means in the image or likeness of God, in other words we are renewed in God’s image. The new man is thereby created or recreated in righteousness and true holiness. Your marginal note will read for true or holiness of truth. That is, the word true there modifies both righteousness and holiness, and it could be translated also the truths righteousness and holiness.

In other words, righteousness and holiness are grounded in the truths of God. Thus basic to man’s nature, man’s psychology, are these two things which are aspects of the image of God: righteousness and holiness. How shall we define these? The definition of holiness is somewhat easier because holiness literally means a cutting. A separation, a dedication, this is the meaning of the Hebrew word. In the new Testament some of the words translated as holiness also have the connotation of vigorous, strong, Godly, and pure. Thus holiness is a separation and a dedication to God which means that we are strong and holy in him because we are cut off from everything else, and grafted into our Lord.

But the definition of righteousness is somewhat more of a problem. The term has been defined as that which is just towards our neighbor. In a sense this is true. Righteousness and justice are virtually the same things, but the definition misses fire because it misses a cardinal aspect of righteousness. In the Greek sense as was very early pointed out by Josephus and others of the ancient Jewish writers, righteousness and justice are social virtues. They are defined socially in terms of what men think. They are not God-centered in definition. How shall we understand this Greek or social definition. Well, this is the definition we have today! In most churches when they talk about righteousness and justice, they are defining it socially and in terms of the basically Greek tradition.

Thus, yesterday I received a letter from a young woman who receives the Chalcedon Report. There was a problem in her church, her denomination, and her own church has recently issued a statement supporting the position taken by and large by most of the churches in her denomination. What happened was this, briefly: A church in a small community some miles out from a big city, had a Christian school. It was an all white community. They were severely criticized by many of the churches in the nearby big city because it was an all white community and an all white school. And again and again the statement was made that they did not give their children a true education because there were no blacks in the school, and therefore their children were somehow being warped and brought up as anti-Christian because they were being denied this aspect of their education.

As a result the local church conference or body of that denomination virtually required this local church to insist that it’s school bus pupils from the black city. This led to a great deal of trouble. First of all, the black children were not happy about going out there it meant for one thing -which no child likes- getting up an hour or two earlier for that long bus drive out to this community. But they were told it was necessary that this was a part of the great cause of the day so they went along with it. Naturally these children coming into this community represented a totally alien group and they stuck together and before long it was a solid group of black pupils against the white, and there was all kinds of trouble. It became a matter of concern not only in the church and the schools but even in the city council, there were so many problems. And so they dropped it. And that was a year ago, and the whole denomination is being turned upside about the wicked, unChristian attitude of this church and school! Now this is the social definition of righteousness and justice!

It is defined in terms of humanistic standards. And this is precisely the problem that confronts us today all around us! The world and the church alike are busy defining righteousness in terms of man’s concept. This is what man always does. He want to define righteousness and justice in abstraction from God, and so he defines it in terms of his idea, and then he turns around and says “Oh, but this part of the Bible obviously is terrible because MY IDEA of righteousness tells me this is wicked!” And you had people say that the God of the old Testament is a God of Wrath but the God of the New Testament is a God of Love- which is utter nonsense.

It’s the one true God in both old and new testaments. And in this way they try and tear the scriptures apart! And having decided the new testament teaches the God of Love they go through the new testament and eliminate most of it because there are hangovers of the old God supposedly in it. Whenever man defines righteousness abstractedly he defines it in terms of his current idea. But the Bible defines it personally in terms of first of all an essentially the personal God. What is righteousness? What is justice? In terms of scripture...

Righteousness is what God is and does and says. It’s that simple. it is nothing separate from God whereby God can be judged by it. Righteousness is what God is and ways and does. So that, righteousness is what scriptures declares. Abraham understood this. When God commanded him to sacrifice his only begotten son to Mount Moriah, which almost certainly is what we know as Calvary, and there give him up as a sacrifice to God... it didn’t sit well with Abraham, he didn’t like it. It did not square with his idea of justice or righteousness, but he knew that God is all righteous, all holy, all just, and therefore he went along with it.

When he got to Mount Moriah and things were at a critical point, God stopped him. And God made it clear to him, “I have the right to require the life of every man having given it, and every man’s life including your life and your son’s life is from me and can be taken by me. But I do not require this of you, Abraham. But that which I do not require of you I require of myself in that in the fulness of time my only begotten son will be that sacrifice which shall be given for the remission of Man’s sins.”

Righteousness is what God is and does and says, so that what the Bible requires of us and what the Bible declares is righteousness is. But man wants an abstract concept of righteousness, one abstracted from God, and from the person of God. When set forth in terms of himself and his ideas and the result is precisely self righteousness. Man will not call evil, he insisted is righteous. Whatever Stalin and Lennon and Crusaaf and Bergeonafe[?] have done they have done as righteousness. But a humanistic righteousness. The last issue of Holend, a propaganda magazine put out by the communist ministry of information, has an article on socialist humanism. It’s very contemptuous of the idea of justice and righteousness and righteousness as scripture declares it! This is the epitome of evil, but it affirms as radical and absolute a concept of righteousness in terms of man. And in terms of that requires every kind of sacrifice from mankind.

Thus man’s evil is called righteousness. Self righteousness. Eve did not say when she suggested to Adam that they disobey God, “go to now, let us do evil.” On the contrary, she submitted to the temptation, “Yea hath God saith, is a thing good or evil because God has said so? God is trying to prevent us from our true righteousness, from finding ourselves as our own God, knowing or determining good and evil for ourselves. Therefore let move forward to the fulness of righteousness by declaring our independence from the arbitrary standards of God and finding by our own experience that which constitutes true righteousness. Satan’s premise in other words was that God is unrighteousness in striving to keep man from independence and autonomy from finding righteousness as it truly is for himself.

God having created man in his own image, man inescapably having been created in righteousness and holiness, even in his fault, even in his sin, will strive after righteousness and holiness... but redefined. And man’s redefinition of righteousness is self righteousness. Calling that which God declares to be evil good, affirming that his rebellion is the essence of true righteousness. And the same is true of holiness!

In terms of scriptural holiness is a separation, a cutting off from everything that is anti God and a dedication to God. Modern man has a great deal to say about holiness, it’s a very popular word incidentally among the hippies, and before them among the beatnecks[?]. A great document about holiness in our modern culture is Alan Ginsberg's famous poem Howl from the early fifties. The proclamation of Howl is that everything that is is holy. Ginsberg, a homosexual and a thorough degenerate, is talking about holiness throughout the poem! And before him Lenny Bruce, the nightclub comedian or pornographer who died a narcotic addict, had in his book written about holiness.

Their concept of holiness is a cutting off, a separation from God. This is all that Ginsberg, as he’s gone around one of the most popular university lectures in Europe and in this country has talked about! Holiness! A total separation from God and his word, from God’s law above all else. A deliberate adoption of everything that is anti biblical law, anti biblical morality. This constitutes for him true holiness.

Man inescapably will seek righteousness and holiness, if not on God’s terms then on his own, which is satanic and demonic. Nor can there be for man any righteousness and holiness in terms of God, unless he returns to the Lord by conversion, by regeneration, and then follows after God in terms of God’s law word, sanctification. This is why we have had no revival in our day. Men have been talking about it for forty years. As I called attention to it a few weeks ago, during the thirties one of the most popular books was entitled “A Return to Religion”. After World War II everyone talked about the fact that there was going to be a great revival and when Billy Graham began they said here is the beginning. Well Billy Graham was spending fifteen sixteen million dollars a year on his revival work, and is the country any better for it?

And we were told when Youth for Christ began and had such an impact, supposedly, that this was another great sign of revival and the same was true of Young Life, Campus Crusade, The Jesus Freaks, and so on.... and all of these have led to nowhere except that we have seen more and more deterioration. And the reason is obvious! They have not sought after true righteousness and true holiness, in fact, the Jesus Freaks are against true holiness, a true cutting off, a separation from that which is unGodly, their idea of holiness actually means an identification with the things that are of the world.

And as a result there is no putting off of the former conversation of the old man which is corrupt according to the deceitful lusts.. and thus no real revival. And they come and they go and they accomplish nothing. A hundred years ago, if a fraction of the percentage that have supposedly been won by our modern revival movements had been won when the country was changed. Righteousness therefore can never be defined apart from God. What God is and does and says in his word.  It therefore requires God’s law. And holiness means a separation from the things that are anti God unto God! It’s root is a cutting off, and therefore it cannot mean an association on the platform all of Billy Graham and Bishop Kennedy and Bishop Pike, now Allah the Jesus Priest, with the hippy culture as though this represented something of a merit.

But we are called upon to put on the new man which is after God, Which after the image of God is created in righteousness and holiness of truth. THE truth of God’s word. This is true righteousness, true holiness, and to this we are called. And God has declared in his word that they who walk in terms of his righteousness and holiness, have as it were a tree of life abounding unto them. But he that sinneth against me wrongeth his own soul. All him that hate me love death. Let us pray.

Almighty God our heavenly Father, we thank Thee that Thou hast called us to Thy righteousness, and to Thy holiness. And give us grace day by day to separate ourselves from all that is a violation of Thy law and of Thee. And to commit ourselves more firmly to Thy word, and that we may be instruments of Thy righteousness and holiness unto this dark world. Grant O Lord that men women and children may be reclaimed, converted to Jesus Christ, that Thy kingdom may be extended, and thy righteousness declared unto all nations. We thank Thee our God so great salvation. We thank Thee for the assurance that is ours in Jesus Christ. Make us ever strong in Thee, in Jesus name, Amen.

Are there any questions now first of all with respect to our lesson?

[short pause]

Yes?

[audience member speaks] [audience member is unintelligible]

Yes. First of all, Witfield is the eclectic man in the picture. Most accounts of the revival in England and this country emphasize Wesley, John Wesley, as the leader. Actually Wesley had little or nothing to do with the revival in this country. He had come here as an episcopal clergy in the South and he left in more than a little disgrace. He went back and he was converted then by the Moravians. We will come to the Moravians in a week or so, and discuss what they did, and so on. The real work was that of Witfield. But because Whitfield was reformed in his doctrine and believed in predestination and the sovereignty of God he’s been shoved into the back ground as though he didn’t exist or really have a part in the whole movement.

In England the work of Whitfield and his associates was so important that a country, which before he and Wesley appeared on the scene had only a handful of churches that were really open, became again a Christian country. Most of the bishops at the time of their birth were political bishops, who were favorites of the king, who rarely ever went to their scene, who just reaped the income from it and then would occasionally assign somebody to a parish or two and very often the parishes remained vacant because it increased their income if there was no rector in the local church all the income from that, from the land that belonged to that church, the rent, would go the bishop. As a result it was to their advantage to have no pastor. Thus the churches that were shut down were legion.

The bishops were immoral men. One of the archbishops of  canterbury, incidentally, had at that time an illegitimate son who was one of the most notorious rakes in England. This was the of picture. Out of that evangelical reawakening you had a renewed church of England you had the Methodist church of Wesley and you had the Calvinistic Methodists of Whitfield. And this really the reason some scholars have said, why England did have a revolution as France did. In some respects the conditions were worse, far worse really, in England than in France.

And when supposedly England was waging war against France under Napoleon, the country with greater liberty was France. That you had this Evangelical nucleus in England that made possible tremendous reforms which overthrew the whole wealthfare system which was so abominable. How many of you incidentally get the Freeman magazine? Well, there was an article about two months ago in the Freeman by Haslett on the poor laws of England. The poor laws which were welfare laws. Those welfare laws were jumped finally, although he doesn’t say so, by the evangelicals through parliament.

I suggested to Gary North to write an article on that to the Freeman because he could do that better than I. It was precisely the evangelical work. First the puritans had done this in the seventeenth century, and that had been overturned, and now again it was the evangelicals under the influence of Whitfield and others a generation or two later who were able to overthrow the welfare system that was destroying England, and it led to the tremendous burst of activity, the industrial revolution, progress, the empire, everything! And then at the end of the century it was Dickens, with his sentimentalism and the fabian socialists who brought back welfarism into England.

So the work in England was tremendous, in this country it was very important also, particularly in the South and central states, Whitfield came over and great crowds heard him everywhere. As a matter of fact --it’s been a long time so my figures may be inaccurate-- did estimate that at least ten thousand heard him in a public square in Philadelphia. And he said his voice was strong so that everyone heard him and they were listening so attentively that the quiet was such that they could hear him, and Franklin, although a reprobate, went to hear him and was so moved he said he made up his mind that he wouldn’t give anything to an evangelist- especially somebody preaching the old fashioned Calvinism that he had left behind him when he left home in New England to go to Philadelphia.

After hearing him for a while he decided he’d given small on the house. Before it was over he’d emptied his pockets when the offering came along. So even Franklin was that much moved! It’s effect was really very great.

[audience member speaks] [audience member is unintelligible]

Mhhm. Yes, it did. What had happened was this. When this country was settled, first of all beginning with the Mayflower, you had a portion of them who came here because of their faith, you had others even on the Mayflower, who came here to get away from the old country or who didn’t have any money and figured well we’ll take our chances there. So that every shipload that came over brought a number of ne'er do wells and people who were a problem for law enforcement. By the time of well 1750 a crisis was developing in this country because you had an increasing element that it was hard to hold down. When you go to the court records for example, in Massachusetts, just in the first fifty-five, seventy years, you find that every boat that came over did bring some Christians but it brought a lot of people who were headaches. And it required a very strict enforcement of Biblical law and a great deal of resistance from these people to the law. In order to keep that community godless! And this was the case everywhere. And in Virginia for example there was a tremendous problem and in the Carolina because these people would then tend to move out toward the frontier areas because there they live as they pleased! And they lived -some of them- like animals.

And it was this that the work of Whitfield did a great deal to alter.

Yes?

[audience member speaks] [audience member is unintelligible]

What-- yes. The word Zion in scripture has reference to a number of things, it’s a general term used for the promised land. It is a term used symbolically for the people of God, and it is a terms used for the kingdom of god when it is established everywhere. SO sometimes it is deliberately used of say Jerusalem. To distinguish between say the Jerusalem that is there and the Jerusalem that should be.

[audience member speaks] [audience member is unintelligible]

As a matter of fact this country was established as a new Zion and this was a term that was very extensively used by the new settlers. This is why we have to know the scriptures because this is how we kn9ow our righteousness. By studying God’s word and by conforming to it. And it’s only in as we grow in grace and in knowledge of his word that we know we are growing in righteousness.

An instance that always amuses me when I recollect it, because the man in question was really a Christian but he was a lazy Christian, and he became very angry once when he heard me speak because I spoke about tithing. That it was a part of God’s law and the scripture and nothing had changed that. This was a great many years ago, and he was VERY upset. And very upset too because the man he sat next to became a tither! And he said “I’ll never have any peace now that I’ve heard that, I was getting along and I was very satisfied with myself, and I figured that was alright with God... now everytime I get my paycheck i’m going to feel a little sick!” Well, at least he was honest, but you see? It was God’s righteousness that he was faced with when the subject of tithing came up! And he was content with his own.

And the way we grow is by studying God’s word. And we don’t always understand it perfectly, but the more we read it the more we understand and the more we are conformed to it.

If there are no further questions, there is something I’d like to share with you. A book was written not too long ago entitled “Radical Sheep and Mau-Mauing the Flak Catchers” it’s by Tom Wolfe. He has upset the liberals more than a little with this book. Mau-Mauing the Flak Catchers, incidentally, needs a little interpretation. Mau-Mauing is something that various government officials practice who subsidise through one government agency or another, our black brothers. They encourage them to let their hair grow long into the African style and exaggerate that, to get the oldest dirtiest clothes they can when they make their demonstrations. So they are encouraged by these government officials to look extremely pugnacious, dirty, smelly, and offensive and then to go to a government office and to make a demonstration there. So there’s one set of government agency that indulge in this mau-mauing practice.

The flak catchers are the people whose job it is , and they’re paid a pretty good salary, every month to do nothing but act as the buffer between the government officials and these mau-mau’s! So the flak catchers are the people whose job it is to go out and talk to these people, so neither governor Rockefeller (once he had to) nor any other government official will need to or have too meet with these mau-maus! So one set of government agencies create them and the other group establishes flak catchers to interview them. Now the Radical sheep has reference to the habit of some of these peoples, the wealthy liberals espousing these Mau-maus.

And the major part of the book deals with the party- you remember Lennard Bernstein put on for the black panthers to raise funds for them, which all the wealthy in New York and as far as Hollywood were invited- a great many such parties were held but unfortunately this one was attended by Tom Wolfe, and he had a tape recorder hidden on his person. And it’s amazing to hear these people talk about killing Whitey and all their hatred for everything these people represent, and just oohing and ahhing about how marvelous this is! So this particular passage I’m going to read to you I think represents the epitome of some of those things.

One of these men is just gotten through saying that “Their only resort now is to get a gun. It’s hopeless, Whitey is killing them off, their children have to eat dog food or go hungry, and black panthers are being shot down by the pig, so Whitey is a pig, we’ve got to kill Whitey.” So Leonard Bernstein said: “That’s marvelous!!” he says it with profound emotion, he sighs, he sinks into his easy chair. Cox- he’s one of the leading black panthers- seizes the moment: “Our minister {unintelligible name}  has said that if we can’t find a meaningful life you know may we then have a meaningful death. And one reason the power structure fears the black panther’s is that they know the black panthers are ready to die for what they believe in and a lot of us have already died.”

Lenning Bernstein seems like a changed man. He looks up at Cox and says: “When you walk into this house, into this building, he lives in a {?} place” and he gestures vaguely as if to take it all in, the molding, the statues, the gourmet foods, the servants... “incidentally he has a section on servants this writer won’t. Since they’re having so many parties for these mau-mau’s they decided it’s bad taste to have a black maid and butler waiting on panthers. The panthers might get uptight about that and there might be an unhappy incident. So they’re out now recruiting and paying extra money for white maids and butlers to wait on their mau-mau’s. The servants, the elevator attendants, and the doorman downstairs in their white dickies, the marble white lobby, the brass stretch and the marquee out front... when you walk into this house you must feel infuriated”.

Cox -this is the black panther- looks embarrassed. “No, I managed to overcome that, that’s a personal thing. I used to get very uptight about those things but--” “Don’t you get bitter? Doesn’t that make you mad, man?” “No, man. That’s a personal thing, see, I don’t get mad about that personally.” “Well,” said Lenning “it makes me mad.” And Cox stares at him.

“This is a very paradoxical situation,” says Lenning “having this apartment makes this meeting possible and if this apartment didn’t exist you wouldn’t have it and yet it’s a very paradoxical situation, and so on.”

(And this is the punch line. I’m skipping some of his profanity.)

Lenning said, swinging his head around toward the rest of the room, “these are all these wealthy liberals. “--Otto Premmature was there too, he was the only one who occasionally talked sense although he wound up agreeing with them-- “most of the people in this room have had a problem about being unwanted. [and Wolfe adds, most of the people in this room have had a problem about being unwanted, there it is!] It’s an odd feeling.

Here they are, the wealthiest of the wealthy and so their bad conscience, their sense of guilt which they call feeling unwanted is leaving them to subsidize the black panthers. Unfortunately for them, Wolfe was there, one of their own, and he turned out to be a feudist. He publicised this in the press, this was originally written for the New Yorker magazine, it’s out in book form and within a few hours they were having to apologize and excuse themselves, and issue all kinds of statements about these black panther parties, and the poor black panthers, most of their funds have been cut off because they can’t have their parties because of nasty of Tom Wolfe.

I think it’s an interesting example of how stupid man the sinner is. Let’s bow our heads now for the benediction.

And now go in peace, God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Ghost, bless you and keep you guide and protect you, this day and always, Amen.

Just one moment, I forgot to make an announcement. I have some announcements here for the Chalcedon Guild dinner. It will be on Saturday, May the 8’th, 7:00pm. The Rev. Robert Fairfax, those who were attending the school seminar -Friday and Saturday- are included in this dinner. For all others it’s $4.00, it’s an opportunity to hear one of the outstanding men in the country in the field of education. Will someone take this to the back and pass them out? Thank you. Take as many copies as you’d like.

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