Eric Lampe

Theology

“Moral Man and Immoral Society”

12/4/06

 

Reinhold Niebuhr

 

            Reinhold Niebuhr was an American man who made a distinguished mark on society in the 20^th century. Before doing this assignment I had never heard of Niebuhr but I came to see that he was an influential figure in a lot of modern American history like the Second World War and Vietnam. Martin Luther King Jr. even sited his books as one of the major influences in his non-violent protests for civil rights. Some people have said that we need a Niebuhr of our time but what exactly does that mean.

            Niebuhr consistently talks about paradoxes and irony. He was a Christian realist. He wanted people to stop looking for a perfect place that could not be achieved and start to realize what was normal. These paradoxes are the two totally contrasting things that need to be balanced. Christianity is almost based completely off paradoxes. The fundamental belief of Christianity that Jesus Christ was both human and divine which is a contradicting statement. In modern day there are many paradoxes. When people say they want to achieve social justice they say they want equality for everyone however in trying to achieve social justice someone must have things taken from them. In order to provide money for the poor someone is going to have to lose money. Thus is the ultimate paradox: sin accompanies the quest for love. With this great contrast in these paradoxes we can learn a great deal about change. Niebuhr says that you can’t force change. You need to take it more gradual and not go from one extreme to the other but make a gradual process.

 

            Niebuhr was a pacifist however come World War II time he was one of the biggest supporters of war. Niebuhr felt we had a responsibility to love other and the Jews in Europe who were being killed were our brothers and sisters and we had a responsibility to save them. Today the United States in a war in Iraq. What would Niebuhr think of that? Niebuhr would say that we are humans and we sin but there is such a thing as evil. In Iraq we needed to recognize that innocent people were being killed by Saddam Hussein. However we also need to see the opposite side of the paradox that we need to be reasonable about what we can and can not do. Be ware of Hubris he would say. We need to confront the evil but be realistic about what could result from what we were doing and practice restraint. I think today this is the big problem people have with the Iraq war. Most people think that some of the things Saddam was doing were wrong but people question how Bush confronted it. Maybe Bush had a little too much hubris. Maybe we needed a Niebuhr.

 

            There is a paradox between Christ and Culture. Christ says that there is a kingdom that is not on in this place but we should try and work to gain a piece or part of the kingdom here on earth. The thing that we need to strive for in the world is not to find a perfect group who has everything figured out and is all wise and all truthful but to realize that this cannot be achieved and that even the people who think or are said to be the wisest people on earth can use criticism.

 

            I think Niebuhr is a very interesting figure and I can really see some of the points that he has. A while back when I did a report on the show Seinfeld I examined the character George. He only went to the extremes of things and therefore became the ultimate and total failure. We are urged to try and find this Golden Mean and in that lies the truth and I think that is part of what Niebuhr is trying to get at is that we should sit back and think things through before we try and change things to how our view of something should be. We can fix so many problems in our world today if we would just think things through better.