The Greatest Law
Stories
Contents
"The Greatest Law" by Frank Ramirez
The Greatest Law
by Frank Ramirez
Matthew 22:34-46
"Teacher, which commandment in the law is the greatest?" (Matthew 22:36)
For all the high-flown language of the Declaration of Independence about the rights of all humanity to “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness,” or the well thought ought structure for a government that would preserve liberty, Great Britain, France, and other European powers were all too ready to dismiss the democratic experiment of the people of the United States.
For one thing, democracy had never been attempted on such a scale, and most nations believed putting power into the hands of ordinary people was dangerous and futile.
But a more important reason for their disdain was the basic contradiction upon which the United States was built on. It proclaimed liberty for all, but millions lived in the abject bondage of slavery. The novelist Charles Dickens, for instance, spoke contemptuously of the “owners, breeders, users, buyers, and sellers of slaves....who would, at this or any other moment, gladly involve America in a war, civil or foreign, provided that it had for its sole end and object the assertion of their right to perpetuate slavery, and to whip and work and torture slaves, unquestioned by any human authority.”
Maybe all this is a good reason to think of the Emancipation Proclamation, issued by Abraham Lincoln at a time when many people doubted his competency and sincerity, as well as its legality, as the Greatest Law in our country’s history.
As a young man he was shaken to the core when he saw the profound grief of slaves being shipped to a new destination and realized how horrible it would be to have no ability to change or improve your life.
Even with this epiphany, Lincoln himself expressed several views about this complex issue throughout his political career. During his famed debates with Stephen A. Douglas he would answer charges that he espoused “negro equality,” as it was called, by saying that he believed in the superiority of the white race, as it was then known, but only called for the political freedom of slaves. He wavered on whether emancipated slaves would ever be full citizens of the United States, doubted whether they should have the vote, and espoused a plan whereby freed slaves would be shipped back to Africa.
Though he was famous for his “House Divided” speech, in which he quoted the words of Jesus that “a house divided against itself cannot stand,” and said he believed utlimately the various states of the union would either all have slavery or none would, he nevertheless insisted, in an August 22, 1862 letter to Horace Greely:
My paramount object in this struggle is to save the Union, and is not either to save or destroy Slavery. If I could save the Union without freeing any slave, I would do it, and if I could save it by freeing all the slaves, I would do it, and if I could save it by freeing some and leaving others alone, I would also do that.
This is the same man who in an 1837 speech in the Illinois state legislature he pronounced slavery “injustice and bad policy.” In 1864 he said, “...if slavery is not wrong, nothing is wrong.”
However, in the famous debates with Stephen A. Douglas Lincoln asserted,
There is a physical difference between the two, which in my judgment will probably forever forbid their living together upon the footing of perfect equallity, and inasmuch as it becomes a necessity that there must be a difference, I, as well as Judge Douglas, am in favor of the race to which I belong, having the superior position.
But the same Lincoln also said that with regards to “the right to eat the bread, without leave of anybody else, which his own hands ears...” the black man “is my equal and the equal...of every living man.”
And elsewhere, “I believe a black man is entitled to...better his condition -- when he may look forward and hope to be a hired laborer this year and the next, for work himself afterward, and finally to hire men to work for him.”
Even during the early months of the Civil War he stuck to his statements that preserving the Union was the main intent of the conflict. Many abolitionists, white and black, were very frustrated with his position. But Lincoln’s heart seems to have finally changed, for despite what he wrote to Horace Greely, he had already informed his cabinet a month earlier he intended to issue an Emancipation Proclamation. Though they largely expressed skepticism about such a move, Lincoln insisted it was the right thing to do.
But first he needed a military victory to keep Englan from intervening on the side of the South. Otherwise it would seem like an act of desperation.
That victory came during the South’s invasion of Maryland, at the Battle of Antietam. It was the bloodiest single day in American history, with some twenty-five thousand casualites combined for both sides.
Nevertheless, it was enough. On September 22 Lincoln issued the document, effective January 1 of 1963.
That on the first day of January, in the year of our Lord one thousand eight hundred and sixty-three, all persons held as slaves within any State or designated part of a State, the people whereof shall then be in rebellion against the United States, shall be then, thenceforward, and forever free....
The Emancipation Proclamation was flawed. Slaves were freed only in those states in rebellion against the Union, not slave states that had sided with the North. Obviously states in rebellion would not honor such a proclamation.
Scholars of the war argue whether the act was enough, or if it was even legal, but in its way it was the Greatest Commandment to be issued in American history, settling the matter of slavery from a moral, rhetorical, and political viewpoint. Amendments to the Constitution would follow, and even then the civil rights of African Americans and other minorities would be restricted for more than a century afterwards.
Perhaps what we see most clearly is that Lincoln sturggled to find the truth, and that with regards to a tough issue, allowed himself to grow, changing his opinion until he reached a time of certainty. We are all growing. Changing. We weren’t who we were. We aren’t what we’re going to be. Our guide are the Greatest Commandments, as given by Jesus.
*****************************************
StoryShare, October 29, 2017, issue.
Copyright 2017 by CSS Publishing Company, Inc., Lima, Ohio.
All rights reserved. Subscribers to the StoryShare service may print and use this material as it was intended in sermons, in worship and classroom settings, in brief devotions, in radio spots, and as newsletter fillers. No additional permission is required from the publisher for such use by subscribers only. Inquiries should be addressed to permissions@csspub.com or to Permissions, CSS Publishing Company, Inc., 5450 N. Dixie Highway, Lima, Ohio 45807.
"The Greatest Law" by Frank Ramirez
The Greatest Law
by Frank Ramirez
Matthew 22:34-46
"Teacher, which commandment in the law is the greatest?" (Matthew 22:36)
For all the high-flown language of the Declaration of Independence about the rights of all humanity to “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness,” or the well thought ought structure for a government that would preserve liberty, Great Britain, France, and other European powers were all too ready to dismiss the democratic experiment of the people of the United States.
For one thing, democracy had never been attempted on such a scale, and most nations believed putting power into the hands of ordinary people was dangerous and futile.
But a more important reason for their disdain was the basic contradiction upon which the United States was built on. It proclaimed liberty for all, but millions lived in the abject bondage of slavery. The novelist Charles Dickens, for instance, spoke contemptuously of the “owners, breeders, users, buyers, and sellers of slaves....who would, at this or any other moment, gladly involve America in a war, civil or foreign, provided that it had for its sole end and object the assertion of their right to perpetuate slavery, and to whip and work and torture slaves, unquestioned by any human authority.”
Maybe all this is a good reason to think of the Emancipation Proclamation, issued by Abraham Lincoln at a time when many people doubted his competency and sincerity, as well as its legality, as the Greatest Law in our country’s history.
As a young man he was shaken to the core when he saw the profound grief of slaves being shipped to a new destination and realized how horrible it would be to have no ability to change or improve your life.
Even with this epiphany, Lincoln himself expressed several views about this complex issue throughout his political career. During his famed debates with Stephen A. Douglas he would answer charges that he espoused “negro equality,” as it was called, by saying that he believed in the superiority of the white race, as it was then known, but only called for the political freedom of slaves. He wavered on whether emancipated slaves would ever be full citizens of the United States, doubted whether they should have the vote, and espoused a plan whereby freed slaves would be shipped back to Africa.
Though he was famous for his “House Divided” speech, in which he quoted the words of Jesus that “a house divided against itself cannot stand,” and said he believed utlimately the various states of the union would either all have slavery or none would, he nevertheless insisted, in an August 22, 1862 letter to Horace Greely:
My paramount object in this struggle is to save the Union, and is not either to save or destroy Slavery. If I could save the Union without freeing any slave, I would do it, and if I could save it by freeing all the slaves, I would do it, and if I could save it by freeing some and leaving others alone, I would also do that.
This is the same man who in an 1837 speech in the Illinois state legislature he pronounced slavery “injustice and bad policy.” In 1864 he said, “...if slavery is not wrong, nothing is wrong.”
However, in the famous debates with Stephen A. Douglas Lincoln asserted,
There is a physical difference between the two, which in my judgment will probably forever forbid their living together upon the footing of perfect equallity, and inasmuch as it becomes a necessity that there must be a difference, I, as well as Judge Douglas, am in favor of the race to which I belong, having the superior position.
But the same Lincoln also said that with regards to “the right to eat the bread, without leave of anybody else, which his own hands ears...” the black man “is my equal and the equal...of every living man.”
And elsewhere, “I believe a black man is entitled to...better his condition -- when he may look forward and hope to be a hired laborer this year and the next, for work himself afterward, and finally to hire men to work for him.”
Even during the early months of the Civil War he stuck to his statements that preserving the Union was the main intent of the conflict. Many abolitionists, white and black, were very frustrated with his position. But Lincoln’s heart seems to have finally changed, for despite what he wrote to Horace Greely, he had already informed his cabinet a month earlier he intended to issue an Emancipation Proclamation. Though they largely expressed skepticism about such a move, Lincoln insisted it was the right thing to do.
But first he needed a military victory to keep Englan from intervening on the side of the South. Otherwise it would seem like an act of desperation.
That victory came during the South’s invasion of Maryland, at the Battle of Antietam. It was the bloodiest single day in American history, with some twenty-five thousand casualites combined for both sides.
Nevertheless, it was enough. On September 22 Lincoln issued the document, effective January 1 of 1963.
That on the first day of January, in the year of our Lord one thousand eight hundred and sixty-three, all persons held as slaves within any State or designated part of a State, the people whereof shall then be in rebellion against the United States, shall be then, thenceforward, and forever free....
The Emancipation Proclamation was flawed. Slaves were freed only in those states in rebellion against the Union, not slave states that had sided with the North. Obviously states in rebellion would not honor such a proclamation.
Scholars of the war argue whether the act was enough, or if it was even legal, but in its way it was the Greatest Commandment to be issued in American history, settling the matter of slavery from a moral, rhetorical, and political viewpoint. Amendments to the Constitution would follow, and even then the civil rights of African Americans and other minorities would be restricted for more than a century afterwards.
Perhaps what we see most clearly is that Lincoln sturggled to find the truth, and that with regards to a tough issue, allowed himself to grow, changing his opinion until he reached a time of certainty. We are all growing. Changing. We weren’t who we were. We aren’t what we’re going to be. Our guide are the Greatest Commandments, as given by Jesus.
*****************************************
StoryShare, October 29, 2017, issue.
Copyright 2017 by CSS Publishing Company, Inc., Lima, Ohio.
All rights reserved. Subscribers to the StoryShare service may print and use this material as it was intended in sermons, in worship and classroom settings, in brief devotions, in radio spots, and as newsletter fillers. No additional permission is required from the publisher for such use by subscribers only. Inquiries should be addressed to permissions@csspub.com or to Permissions, CSS Publishing Company, Inc., 5450 N. Dixie Highway, Lima, Ohio 45807.
