Don Watson has called this the age of ‘weasel words’, although the term is not exactly new, as Theodore Roosevelt saw it as an established expression when he used it back in 1916. Hardly anything now means what it is supposed to mean, and so there are clichés and jargon to cover the lack of thought and/or meaning. The first weasel words were uttered by Adam in the Garden after the Fall: ‘The woman whom You gave to be with me, she gave me fruit from the tree, and I ate’ (Gen.3:12). Nothing that Adam says is designed to reveal anything or to admit to any truth; all is designed to shift the blame away from himself. The main issue – his sin – is studiously sidestepped.
How different is it when truth, clarity and beauty are combined in an utterance. ‘To make an apt answer is a joy to a man, and a word in season, how good it is!’ (Prov.15:23) Indeed, ‘A word fitly spoken is like apples of gold in a setting of silver’ (Prov.25:11). Words can be a fountain of life (Prov.10:11), a tree of life (Prov.15:4), a honeycomb (Prov.16:24), or a bubbling brook (Prov.18:4). They can encourage, illumine, impart truth, lift spirits, even give life. They can also mislead, crush, and, in a sense, kill. Hence the Christian is to hear the injunction of Paul: ‘Let your speech always be gracious, seasoned with salt, so that you may know how you ought to answer each person’ (Col.4:6). This is all very sobering for as Spurgeon noted: ‘Time and words can never be recalled.’
At the most basic level, we must mean what we say. Our ‘yes’ must mean ‘yes’ and our ‘no’ must mean ‘no (James 5:12), unless there are extenuating circumstances which cry out for a change of mind (see 2 Cor.1:12-2:4). Western society has descended to the dangerous level where people do not take words seriously anymore. The situation is quite schizophrenic: people take great offense at what hardly seems to be more than vigorous language, while the social media are full of vicious and quite vile attacks of one group upon another.
Ever since the Russian Revolution of 1917 we have been aware that ‘People’s Republic’ is actually code for one-party dictatorship – in fact, more usually, one-man dictatorship. Yet it does not end with the professional deceivers who run, admittedly in different ways, North Korea or the Western media. In April 2014 Philip Nitschke wrote an article where he claimed that ‘We need a new word for suicide’. This former medical practitioner is in love with death, and thinks that what he calls ‘rational suicide’ ought to be something that Australia is proud of. But to sell the idea, he thinks he might need another name – something to sanitise the whole business. A few months later the Sydney Morning Herald reported the death of Julia Trubridge-Freebury, an old campaigner for unrestricted abortion rights and world peace from the 1960s. Ms Trubridge-Freebury – and Boswell complained of Wilberforce’s ‘big resounding name! – revelled in the fact that she had aborted four babies. Nevertheless, the headline for her eulogy was ‘Love of children motivated activist’. ‘Love’ is an especially rubbery term these days.
All this is to be expected, I suppose. A modern classic has to be an order of service prepared in 2012 for multi-faith religious celebrations in NSW public schools. Here is one of the prayers:
Merciful God, we pray for students in NSW schools, that through all that we learn we will develop respect for the right of other people to have different beliefs, ideals and ways of doing things, within the laws of our county. Help us to follow in the footsteps of Jesus who showed us how to follow God’s laws in a way that makes a difference to all who we come in contact with.
It is not quite the prayer of Elijah on Mt Carmel as he confronted the prophets of Baal, and it certainly misses the point of Jesus’ mission by the proverbial mile. But that was not the main concern of the Department of Education. The prayer was never intended to communicate to the God of the Bible, but to keep the natives locked up in the mindset of political correctness. To point this out is probably racist, but such are the risks involved in stating the obvious.
How refreshing, even to the depths of our being, to turn from the prevailing falsehood and deception, and to listen to Christ as He ministers truth to us: ‘The words that I have spoken to you are spirit and life’ (John 6:63).
With warmest regards in Christ,
Peter Barnes