Carey Griffel: [00:00:00] Welcome to Genesis Marks the Spot where we raid the ivory tower of biblical theology without ransacking our faith. My name is Carey Griffel, and today we're going to get into a bit of a side topic again and we're going to talk about Jordan Peterson. About four weeks ago, I had the opportunity to go see Jordan Peterson live, so I thought that I would take the opportunity to bring him up and talk about his work from the lens of this podcast, and touching on a few things that are commonly talked about in Christian circles when Jordan Peterson's name is brought up.
Now, hopefully I won't go into too many side tangents here, but I do have a lot to say when it comes to Jordan Peterson and his ideas and his impact in the world and how people approach him and look at his work. So we'll just see how this episode goes. I apologize in advance if I get a [00:01:00] little bit on my soapbox in this episode.
So Dr. Jordan B. Peterson, he is a Canadian psychologist. Yes, that's right. A psychologist. So then you're wondering why I'm talking about him here on a biblical theology podcast? Well, we'll get to that. He's gotten quite popular for a variety of reasons, most of which are political, and I'm not really gonna go into those specifically beyond the saying that a lot of it is centered on the use of pronouns.
But it turns out that, oddly enough, controversy and loudly standing up for what is right can, at times at least, make one popular. Even if you're fighting against the common narrative. I mean, it does help that he's very eloquent, at least I think so. I know a lot of people do think he is a bit long-winded and hard to follow when he talks. When people say that, it reminds me of what people say about NT Wright, the criticism that he often gets that he's hard to understand. [00:02:00] I think a lot of that is just that people like this use a lot of words and they don't always use the words that people want to hear them use... the common phrases that we're so used to hearing all of the time, so when somebody doesn't use those exact words, sometimes we wonder what it is they actually mean.
Anyway. Jordan Peterson has been a clinical psychologist and he has taught and researched in university, and it was in the academic setting that he got into initial trouble. Of course, it hasn't just been there. He's also gotten in trouble in places like Twitter for some of the things he said. That is, of course, not that uncommon of a thing on a platform like Twitter. Anyway, he has three books out maps of Meaning. 12 Rules for Life. And Beyond Order, 12 More Rules for Life. It's my understanding that he is currently finishing up another book as we speak. But aside from all that, you [00:03:00] can find many lectures on YouTube and he also has an exclusive deal with the company Daily Wire, to produce and share exclusive content. On his website there are several other things that are of interest there. There's lectures and classes and a personality test which tests for the big five personality traits. He also has an interesting thing. ...I think it's an app that's supposed to help you with writing. He has a document, an essay writing guide, that is specifically geared towards helping you with your writing. It's quite interesting, some really good advice there. So he's got a lot of stuff going on and he's kind of an interesting guy in general. , As I was researching this episode, I found out that it's actually his birthday this week. So happy birthday, Dr. Peterson.
So why am I talking about Jordan B. Peterson here on my biblical theology podcast? Well, [00:04:00] for one thing, even though this is a biblical theology podcast, as maybe you've caught on by now, I like to get into some topics with the lens of biblical theology, because I think that biblical theology is actually much more applicable than is often assumed.
Also, Dr. Peterson talks about the Bible. He talks about the Bible a lot. But he tends to use a very interesting lens to talk about the Bible in ways that we are not used to hearing. I've seen this really resonate with some people and with other people, I've seen them act like Peterson is a wolf in sheep's clothing just because he's talking about the Bible. Why would a psychologist talk about the Bible? How dare he? Why would anyone want to hear a psychologist of all people talk about the greatest book that was ever written? I don't know. I feel like the people who are very against listening to it don't really like [00:05:00] psychology in general and there's plenty of people out there like that. And if that's you, that's fine. I know that not everyone likes to hear things described in psychological terms. That's just not how you think. It's not helpful to you, whatever it is. But what I do know is that I've talked to more than one person who said that Peterson was actually an instrumental part of their walk towards and into Christianity. So I feel like it's really worth getting into this topic and how Jordan Peterson and his work intersects with Christianity and kind of how we can see that from our perspective. And I say our perspective because there's kind of this fuzzy idea that is Jordan Peterson a Christian? Is he not a Christian? Does he just believe in a general God? Does he not believe in a general God? There's this whole discussion about it and I don't know if you're into that kind of thing, but I'm [00:06:00] going to kind of touch on some of that according to what I think, because I think there are better and worse ways that we Christians can approach that kind of a thing.
But also I'm going to get into some very specific things of what he's taught before and how some of his teachings that I see really intersect well with our study of the Bible. We're gonna talk in particular about archetypes and we're gonna talk about some of the things that he talked about in the lecture that I was able to attend.
All right, so first I kinda have to start with this gossip topic, right? Is Jordan Peterson a Christian, or is he not a Christian? First of all, I'm just gonna say it. , I think it is gossip to even really be talking about it to begin with. We don't know him personally. He's a public figure. And we want our [00:07:00] public figures, you know, to be following Christ. Of course we do. We want everyone to be following Christ. And being called to proclaim the good news of the kingdom of God, that goes out to everyone. So a public figure ought to be receiving the good news just as much as anyone should. So I get that. And maybe we just say, well, he's not a Christian because he doesn't come out and just say it. He doesn't say, I am a Christian, I follow Christ. He hasn't said that. So maybe that's just where we leave it at and say he's not a Christian because he hasn't made that declaration public. And I kind of think fair enough, you know. Following Christ is something that we do with our whole selves, and it should be a public thing. We shouldn't be ashamed of it. We shouldn't be hiding it. We should just be very forthright with who we are following. Right? So, yeah, I agree with that,[00:08:00] but it's honestly my opinion that we Christians tend to spend a little too much time trying to decide who's a Christian and who's not, who's in our club, and who isn't in our club. Frankly, in a way, it's none of our business. It's God's business.
If you listen to my faith story, which is one of my podcast episodes, you know that I was raised LDS and even though I now think I was wrong on a number of levels in my faith when I was younger, I'd still call my younger self a Christian.
Now, is this the same thing? Not necessarily, but my point is that we get a bit wrapped up in who's who. And in my experience that does tend to be... debilitating when it comes to talking to people about Jesus. I've wondered before, why does it really matter that much? Like shouldn't we just act like [00:09:00] we should to other people and tell them about Jesus, you know, no matter what? Well, I've had some people say it does matter because how do we know how, who to evangelize and who not to evangelize? How do we know who to greet as a brother in Christ and and who isn't? And to some extent, we do kind of need to make those judgements sometimes. But here's my suggestion.
Why not take people at their word of what they say, of who they are and build upon that foundation instead of trying to tell them just how wrong they are about what they said about themselves, and just how, misguided of a path they might be on? Why don't you meet them where they are and disciple them forward?
So in that context, it's a fair question to say if Jordan Peterson hasn't outright declared allegiance to Jesus, how could we possibly think that he is on any kind of a Christian path?[00:10:00] Well, a couple of episodes ago, in episode 25, I talked about the concept of faith as believing loyalty.
Believing loyalty is both mental assent as well as acting out allegiance. And what has Jordan Peterson said? He said he acts like God exists. Is that believing loyalty? Is that enough? Do we need to see a particular series of actions to evidence what believing loyalty is?
Now look, I'm not saying I have all the answers here. I'm not saying I can say either way. I mean, I can point to the New Testament and the way people live life together in Christian communities, being baptized, being under authority of an elder. We can say that if you're not doing those things and you're not living that way, then you're not truly a Christian.
That might be fair to say, but are we absolutely sure that we're [00:11:00] not adding to the gospel by doing things like that? Are we absolutely sure about that? Because I think we ought to be absolutely sure that what we're talking about when we're talking to people about the gospel is the gospel.
Let's be kind of honest here.
We are judgmental creatures. We're humans. We wanna say, oh no, I'm Christian and I don't want to be judgmental, but we are. We point to that one verse about not judging, but that verse isn't about not judging. It's about judging rightly for the right things. We should judge according to things that we wish ourselves to be judged for.
We ought to make sure things are true and right. We wanna make sure we're pursuing that which is true and good. We need to continually be searching out that good path and try to be on it ourselves. But we're never really on it ourselves without mixed motivations. So when we judge, we're not always [00:12:00] so pure of motive as we would wish.
I myself get admittedly a little exasperated sometimes about how Christians tend to judge other people. I mean, I get exasperated at those who don't explicitly claim to be followers of Christ as well. But we Christians get on our high horses and then we pretend to be humble. That's called hypocrisy, by the way. And welcome to the story. We're all hypocrites. Anyway. I'm as judgmental as the next person. I mean, here I am on this little rant right now, but I've been in the shoes of Christians calling me a non-Christian, even as I actively pray to a God in the name of Jesus Christ and believe in Jesus who walked this earth, who lived and died for me, who is resurrected and who is seated as king of creation.
All of my life, I'd proclaim those things, and yet for maybe half or so of my life, Christians would've called me a non-Christian. So I kind of get this, [00:13:00] I get this kind of judgment from that angle.
It's just that I've seen plenty of Christians say, you can't be a Christian... if. You can't be a Christian if we can't see you repent of your sins. And by this, it seems that they mean that they should be able to see me no longer struggling with them. Or you can't be a Christian if you don't confess the creeds of the early church. You can't be a Christian if you don't attend an approved Christian building on Sundays. You can't be a Christian if you don't believe in the eternal conscious torment of hell. Or you can't be a Christian if you aren't baptized. This often conveniently accompanies being on the membership roster of an organization. You can't be a Christian if we don't see you call on the name of Jesus, evangelize, get discipled... in the way that we expect to see that happen.
Now, [00:14:00] you know what? Some of those things might be factually true. Maybe you're no true Scotsman... I mean no true Christian, if you don't fit into those patterns. Maybe, what do I know? But doing those things also doesn't guarantee that you are a Christian. Remember not everyone who says, Lord, Lord...? What if we just gave up trying to be the arbiters of someone's salvation?
What if we just gave up trying to figure out that for ourselves? Oh, I know. Of course, we're not trying to be the arbiters. We know it's all up to God. But are we so sure that we are leaving that in his hands fully? My friend who says, well, we need to know who to evangelize. ...well, let me tell you from someone who's been there, being constantly evangelized is a bit draining and insulting, honestly. It seems there's a difference between evangelism and discipleship. True. [00:15:00] But why is it so hard for us to just accept that people might really be where they say they are?
What is evangelism, anyway? The root of that is the gospel. And what is the gospel? Telling the good news of King Jesus, which encompasses the whole Bible, of course, the whole Bible in the lens of Jesus Christ, Jesus the Messiah, Jesus the king.
Yes, Jesus as our personal king. But that's just a small part of Jesus as the cosmic king. I think it's hard to see where people are. We communicate so differently sometimes, and so often we just want people to say and be the way that we are. I know that's a problem I have and you know, it's exasperated by the fact that sometimes we're right.
Sometimes it frankly would be better if people were more like us in some particular way. [00:16:00] But sometimes people have different frameworks that they fit within and trying to squeeze into yours just isn't going to quite work, right though you may be.
I think of the criticisms that I have brought up with Answers in Genesis. Do I think I'm wrong in my assessment of them? No. Does that mean they're not Christian? Certainly not. We all have a set of standards and preconceived notions that comes with our beliefs. They call out people like me because I'm not following their thinking, and I do the same. Is it possible to meet together over something? Can we meet together? Hopefully over worship... except they might not like that so much. I don't know. Being too insistent of my way can be a legitimate barrier, and that's why I caution against all of these [00:17:00] things.
I think too of the criticisms I've heard about Tim Mackie and the Bible Project. I love the Bible Project. And I've seen Tim Mackie give the most eloquent sermons. I can't myself doubt in his sincerity as a believer, but I've seen others outright declare him a heretic. Of course, sometimes people love that word a bit too much. Sometimes we believe ourselves to be the gatekeepers of biblical truth. But I've read and watched several of these claims, and generally they stem from one or two areas.
One is a couple of videos from a sermon or lecture about hell that Tim gave. In this, Tim Mackie talked about hell in a way that certainly didn't sound like most traditional teachings about hell. So it's concluded that Tim Mackie is a heretic. [00:18:00] Nevermind the fact that throughout church history, the doctrine of hell actually hasn't been as nice and neat as we want to think. There is room for disagreement on this one.
The other thing I've seen is that there is a complaint that Tim Mackie and the Bible Project don't teach penal substitutionary atonement. If you're not familiar with the term, that's the prevailing view of atonement taught in American evangelical churches, and no doubt, plenty of other places as well.
The term is of course not found in the Bible, which is why the Bible Project doesn't use the term by the way. But in a nutshell, it centers on Christ as coming to earth and suffering for our individual personal sins, because otherwise justice cannot be satisfied and God could not forgive us. Now, there's more I could say about that, but listen, just because someone chooses to use biblical language, that doesn't [00:19:00] mean they're rejecting a systematic teaching necessarily.
And I would also say just because somebody uses psychological terms doesn't mean that they're rejecting the truth of the Bible either. Anyway, my general point is that just because somebody doesn't talk about something in the way that you want to hear it talked about that doesn't mean that they are completely off the rails.
The fact that we frequently have communication problems between people and that people don't understand where you're even coming from, ought to indicate that we ought to be a little bit more cautious in our estimation of what someone is saying.
I was just listening to another lecture that Jordan Peterson gave. He said straight out and exceptionally sincerely that he really believes that we were created like Genesis one says in the image of God,[00:20:00] and he went on a bit about what he thought that meant, that we have a real power in the world to make heaven or hell here. And he talked about our complex motivations and how we don't even understand our own selves completely, that we can't know our own selves because we're so complex.
And from everything he says everywhere, it's like he really takes that seriously. He's expressed that he's very careful talking about belief in God, because to him, if you declare that, then by golly, you'd better live up to that because it's our actions which show what we really believe. He stresses that he has also said repeatedly that he tries to act like he believes in God.
So you tell me. If he thinks we're made in the image of God, if he continually pursues righteousness and a life like he acts like God exists, and he further says [00:21:00] that it's our actions which tell what we really believe. How does that not lead to a genuine belief in God? And I don't know, just like I can actually say for certain what my own standing with God is or anyone else's standing. I have no idea. I understand that we wanna see someone walking in a Christian way doing the rituals that we do. Maybe they're necessary and maybe that's a line that he needs to cross, or maybe we can just trust that a person can be authentically where they claim to be, and then trust God in his faithfulness to determine what that ultimately means.
Because here's the thing. In the Old Testament, we think there was one way to go about being a follower of God. Well, people had to be in the camp of Israel, right? Well, what about Rahab of Joshua 2? What about Naaman of Second Kings? Today we have such a [00:22:00] wide variety of places to be as a Christian, various denominations, liturgical, non liturgical, local congregations, house churches.
Where in all of that mess do we find real Christians? Some think there is only one place for the true church to gather. Some are convinced in their priesthood. Some are certain that being part of the body is being an active part of baptism and communion in a certain place. Well, maybe they're right, but here's a secret.
None of us know. We are all each of us playing in our own sandboxes. Some of us might have the right castles we've built. I myself, I look at Scripture and I'm just not at all sure that God's hands are as tied as we tend to think they are.
Anyway, maybe we should just be consistent. [00:23:00] If you're praying for Peterson's salvation, you ought to be praying for yours too, as it seems that's a biblical thing. See the Psalms on that for some guidance.
God is in pursuit of his people as he has been since the beginning. We too are in search of God continually, and I think we ought to praise God when we see this actively lived out in our own lives or in the lives of others. We're so judgmental, but you know, we have to be. We're so fickle and we're easily deceived. It's that fact of deception that we fear poses a real problem and , of course, it does. I mean, when we look into those early chapters of Genesis, it seems that deception played a real role in how things went down there. Of course, responsibility remained because there's ways to tell you're being deceived if you are crafty enough.
Talking about Jordan Peterson, of [00:24:00] course, he talks a lot about archetypes. Some of us don't like that focus. We'd rather talk about historical realities. Because many of us have sunk our faith on the historical reality of Scripture, we want everyone else to acknowledge that too. And I get it. I feel like, especially in this day and age, this is a big battlefield and it's an important piece of the faith of many, and I'm not trying to downplay that, but I'll tell you a secret.
I myself prefer the themes of archetypes because I look around myself and frankly, that's what I see. These patterns. I see patterns in my own life. I see patterns constantly at play in my family. I see the struggles we have over and over and I see how it really is only the details that change. For me, it's the patterns that form one of the strongest foundations of my own faith. We have patterns of [00:25:00] sin and it's little adjustments, but it's the same fundamental sins. Those patterns could really be easily explained any number of ways without invoking God, which makes sense because it's not God who is the author of sin.
So you can explain sin without God. What's harder to understand to my way of thinking is how you explain that those patterns of sin and chaos, how do they not destroy the world over and over. There are also patterns of good, you know. You could try to explain those via naturalistic means. Maybe despite lots of evidence to the contrary, maybe we don't actually want to destroy ourselves. Maybe our drive for self and species preservation really is strong enough for us to survive in spite of all that self-destruction that we do. But it's almost impossible, it seems to me, to live as if there's no purpose or meaning beyond ourselves. [00:26:00] Like Peterson said, our actions betray our motivations and our real beliefs, and we tend to live like we matter. Like humanity has value, like creation has value, and we're supposed to treat it like that. We live like Genesis one shows us to live. Oh, we mess it up continually. We can't leave it at Genesis one. We need something else. We need the incarnation. We live our lives as if it's possible for the divine to enter into creation, into humanity in particular.
And so to me, it's the archetypes that tell the true story. It's the archetypes that tell us the truth in a nutshell that we need. And despite the fact that we see it played out continually before us, we really do seem to need those condensed stories. If it's the historical realities that really speak to you [00:27:00] well, who am I to say anything against that?
In saying that, I'm not suggesting it's relative, like you believe what you want and I'll believe what I want. No, I'm saying that different imaginations get captured differently. We have a tendency to want to flatten it all out. I don't think we should do that. The diversity and variety we see in humanity is a beautiful thing.
We need people who view the world concretely. We also need those who view the world through poetry. We need scientists and we need storytellers. We need philosophers and historians and theologians and psychologists.
My views have of course, adjusted over the years. I used to be a staunch defendant that Adam and Eve had to be historical figures, and that's how we read that. It meant things like literal changes in humanity with the fall.
Now it stands to reason that if Christ came [00:28:00] in response to the fall, that he'd need to fix every one of those problems that came from that fall, right? Stomping the serpent? Check. The whole striking the head and heel thing? Check. Reducing pain in childbearing? Well, not sure about that one. Fixing whatever that desiring and ruling pattern is between husbands and wives? Check, done as a consequence of our sanctification. Thorns, and thistles and sweat? Well, that's another one I'm not sure about. Death? Check. Well, four out of six ain't bad... except, well, we're talking about the Messiah here, so those odds really aren't that great.
Okay, so that's Adam and Eve as historical figures with Jesus fixing the historical problems. What about Adam and Eve as archetypes? What does that mean? Does that even change anything?[00:29:00] Aren't the results of the fall still a thing?
Well, the serpent, the death, the repair and relationships, those are all dealt with archetypically. What about the pain in childbearing and the thorns and thistles? Let's take that first thing for a second. And by the way, I'm not trying to say that this is necessarily how we should read this. I'm just giving an option to get our wheels turning.
First, I'd like to back up a bit in things and suggest that what we have going on in the garden narrative is a couple of things. Number one, we are the idols of God placed to represent him in his cosmic temple. Number two, as evidenced by a few things such as his covenantal name, Adam and Eve... that means all of humanity... are in a covenantal relationship with our creator.
So breaking covenant means consequences and we, just like [00:30:00] Adam and Eve, all individually break covenant. We break relationship with God. How do we get back into covenant? It's not because we pick ourselves up by our bootstraps. It's because God himself comes down both in the form of Jesus the Christ as well as in the form of the Spirit to indwell us.
Does God care about repairing us physically so that we no longer feel pain? You and I both know we still feel pain. We mothers know that we feel pain both in the act of giving birth as well as in the act of raising children. Let me ask this question. What would the meaning of that pain be if we remained outside covenant with God?
Not only would we be physically in pain, but it would be orders of magnitude worse in the fact that our children also would remain [00:31:00] separated from God. Merge that with a desire to control everything in our lives. .. There's no rest in that. No joy, no peace. Just anguish in the act of fulfilling our creation mandate only for the end of destruction and death.
Likewise, humanity is to care for the earth. If our actions in that also end in futility, then what becomes the point of creation at all? What is the purpose when in the end, it is only suffering? No reward, no vibrant life. Where does all of that end up now, with Jesus enthroned as king and with the Spirit in us? Rather than an end of destruction, we get life.
We have a savior upon whom we may cast our cares. He asked for the children to be brought to him, and he said that the kingdom would be like the mustard seed. Our suffering in [00:32:00] childbirth brings children to Christ. And our various toil in the world builds his kingdom.
Now, do I still believe in a final and consummate very real new heaven and earth? Absolutely, because I truly believe that God created creation physically and that he wasn't kidding around with his original purposes. He wasn't just like, well, you guys are gonna mess this up physically, but that's okay. I'll just do a spiritual reality instead. No, I, I think that there was always one purpose, and that purpose is and will be completely and utterly fulfilled.
But what matters in my day-to-day is that my current life is also already a part of that. I believe our day-to-day realities can fit within that. I believe our lives best lived fit into the truth that Jesus has brought.
So now let's talk about truth. [00:33:00] This was the theme of the lecture that I got to see about a month ago. Dr. Peterson was expounding on the eighth rule from his book, 12 Rules for Life. And the eigth rule states, "Always tell the truth, or at least don't lie."
So there I was in this auditorium, a huge auditorium. And it was absolutely packed with people who were there to see a psychologist lecture. And he lectured about telling the truth.
That's incredible. He actually said that this rule is the most important rule. I find that fascinating for a couple of different reasons. Of course, it seems to be kind of an innate human thing that we should really believe that truth is better than lies, right? [00:34:00] That seems to be embedded into the very fabric of being human.
And yet when you look at the 10 Commandments, there's not a commandment that tells you not to lie. No, really, there's not a commandment that says that. The closest we have is the commandment in Exodus 20:16, which says, you shall not bear false witness against your neighbor. I bet many of us think that that is a prohibition against lying as a whole, but it's not.
It's very specific. It's against bearing false witness in court against your neighbor. What do we do with the fact that the foundation of the entire law in the Old Testament, the 10 Commandments, doesn't tell us not to lie? That's so weird. Right?
It doesn't take us very long to see that there is a whole bunch of lying that goes on in the book of Genesis. [00:35:00] We tend to focus a lot on the fact that there's lies in Genesis three. You know, the half lie, perhaps that the serpent gave, the fact that Eve added the words do not touch to the, the rule about the tree, Adam not being forthright with God. And we, we tend to kind of zoom in on those as, aha, these are the sins, these are the problems that are present in Genesis three.
I'm not entirely sure that that's how we should read the text. I'm not sure it's the lie aspect of things that is a, the fundamental problem. And what else do we have? In Genesis four, we have Cain, who claims he doesn't know where his brother is. Cain wasn't living his authentic life to begin with, and that's what started that whole debacle.
We could add lies into , the incident before the flood where the intentions of humanity was evil continuously. But it doesn't [00:36:00] specify lying there.
Just about the instant we get out of the primeval narrative of Genesis one through 11, we have Abram and Sarai in Egypt, and Abram lies about Sarai being his wife. And what happens? Abram doesn't get punished for the lie. God afflicts Pharaoh at his house because Pharaoh unknowingly took Sarai into his harem. Like, that's bizarre. Wouldn't we think that the lie is the problem there? Why is Abram just getting away with that? And of course, we have the same thing happen three separate times in the Book of Genesis, and nothing ever calls it out like you think it will.
There are some other things that happen in the book of Genesis that we might characterize as lies depending on how we're defining that. But for sure, there was a whole lot [00:37:00] of lying going on with Jacob who may not have been lying specifically when he took Esau's birthright, but he for sure wasn't being super forthright.
Of course, you have Isaac in Egypt, you have Laban who gives away Leah instead of Rachel, you have Jacob who sneaks away from Laben and Rachel who took the teraphim from her father. In Genesis 34, the brothers lie to the people of Shechem to get revenge for what happened to their sister. In Genesis 38 Tamar tricks Judah because of the injustice that he laid upon her. And some of these we tend to justify the lies, like they had good reasons for lying, so that time it was okay. But we, we can't say that across the board with all of these lies. I don't think we can say that ethically Genesis ever says anything against lying at all.
And honestly, there's precious little in the entire Old Testament that suggests that lying itself is much of a [00:38:00] problem. So what do we do with that? Because we certainly wanna say that lies are unethical. I think it's pretty simple just to say that the Old Testament is not an ethical handbook. It's just not.
What we see in the Old Testament is a whole bunch of people, doing a whole bunch of things in the way that they want to do them and to get what they want out of a situation. The Bible isn't condemning these actions, which seems really weird to us because we think that it should and that it would.
There are a few places that we could point to that seem to indicate the evil of lying. Leviticus 19:16, for instance, says, Quote, you shall not go around as a slanderer among your people and you shall not stand up against the life of your neighbor. I am the Lord, end quote.
So I won't say that there's nothing in the Old Testament that talks against lying, but it's so little compared to what we would think that we would see.
[00:39:00] We even see God conceivably acting out lies. There's a really good Naked Bible Podcast episode on this it's number 210 entitled God and Deception. I'll try and remember to link it in the show notes. So we have legitimate situations where even God is seen lying.
Now, the New Testament does directly call out deception as an evil. In Mark 7:22, it is in a list of evil acts that includes coveting, wickedness, sensuality, envy, slander, pride and foolishness, along with sexual immorality, theft, murder, and adultery. So that's more the kind of ethical list of evil things that we want to see lying wrapped up in.
Deceit is also included in several other lists in the New Testament as an explicit sin. So we're not wrong in saying that lying is wrong. What we [00:40:00] need to realize between the Old Testament and the New Testament is that ethics changed. They just did. However, there's other ways that we can see the concept of lying, even if we can't see the specific action of lying as deceit being called out in the Old Testament.
And some of these things are what Jordan Peterson got into during his lecture that I attended. His lecture was steeped with biblical imagery and biblical stories and biblical themes. So you see along with Jordan Peterson, I don't think that lying is, in fact absent from the Old Testament.
We just need to do a little bit of work to get to it. And we also need to realize that our ethics are not grounded in the way that people in the Old Testament behave. Right? People are terrible demonstrators of ethics, really. We don't function as we should. As Joshua Sherman and I have been saying on the imaging series, the non-functioning human [00:41:00] imagers are all over the place in Scripture.
So our ethics aren't grounded in the action of the humans in the Old Testament. Our ethics are grounded in the character of God. They are grounded in the things that God asks of people. They are grounded in the fact that occasionally we manage to function according to our role and status as images of God.
And this, I think is really what Jordan Peterson was drilling down to into his lecture, that people more or less are living truthful lives or lives that are seeped in the opposite of truth, which is of course lies. One of Peterson's points was that when you're living a lie, you're not actually living yourself. The lie is not the true you because the lie is not the image of God. If you're living a lie, you are by definition not living your own life.
Now, let's talk about the definition of what lying [00:42:00] is. Lying is more than just saying something that is untruthful. More than that, we can talk about living out truth or living out lies.
Now we're not omniscient, and a lot of times we don't really even know what the truth is. So sometimes we act out things and we don't really know if it's the truth or not. So the question is how do you tell the difference? How can you tell when you're living the truth and when you're not? You're not actively lying because you just don't know. Ignorance is not the same as lying.
It's a trickier question than we want to admit. But Peterson said that you do sometimes know when you lie, and as you practice not lying, you get a little better at knowing truth from lies. I think that's probably the case. And of course, we also need to ask why shouldn't we lie sometimes? Because lying gets us what we want. Lying doesn't always seem to lead to negative consequences [00:43:00] immediately. That's certainly what we see in Genesis. In fact, they often get what they want out of what they do. And of course telling the truth, just like Abram realized, telling the truth can get you in trouble.
So sometimes we have some seemingly valid reasons to lie. I think anyone who is approaching the subject of truth and lies and who doesn't admit that it's more advantageous in some ways to lie than it is to tell the truth, well, we're not looking at it carefully enough and we're not being truthful enough.
However, in the big picture, in the grand scheme of things, living truthfully, living authentically is truly always the better choice, even if it doesn't seem like it in the moment. Peterson gives a number of really good examples for this. One of the core stories he used was the story of Jonah. Jonah goes to all [00:44:00] the trouble to go the exact opposite direction from the way he should be going, and for a while he seems to get away with it, but he doesn't, and his consequences end up putting not only himself in danger, but other people as well.
I loved listening to Jordan Peterson tell the story of Jonah. If you've heard him do retellings of stories in his lectures, you'll know what I mean. It's really amusing. But it's, not just that Jonah was avoiding responsibility, it's that he was avoiding living his life authentically. This means that our lives are wrapped up in the will and desire of God, not just what we want to have happen, not just what we think is the right thing, but it's God's will. And it's God's truth that ultimately matters. If we're not living into that, then we're not truly living our lives. And even more than what this means to us, society [00:45:00] is predicated on living into God's will. Our civilization is based on the fact that humanity has intrinsic worth as the image of God, and it's easy to think that we shouldn't lie to other people and that we shouldn't lie to God. But I don't think we take seriously into account the fact that our entire lives are lived either truthfully or not truthfully. And like Peterson says, we can't always tell if we're living to the full extent of truth, but that's why we need to strive towards that. The message is a powerful one, and it connects to the fact that we are each individuals who are created by God, and we have unique contributions that we can give to the world. But in order to do that, we have to live into ourselves rather than into something that is not ourselves.
I like what Jordan Peterson says when he says that we can't tell what would happen if we truly live in the truth. We don't know what that would be like. [00:46:00] That's what we should be striving for. If we're not ourselves when we're living, then we're something else.
It's like Cain giving into the sin that is crouching at his door, like living into our fears of what those who hold power over us can do to us, rather than trusting in God who created us. Short term convenience can never trump living out our lives authentically to our full potential as imagers of God.
You know, we want nice, smooth, easy lives. We want all of these things handed to us. We don't want any struggles. We don't want any difficulties. We don't want any challenges, or at least that's what we think, but I don't think that's the truth. I don't think that's how we actually want to live our life. We want to be pushed to our limits. If we're not allowing ourselves to be pushed to our limits, then we're holding ourselves back and we're not living to the best of our ability. We don't like to admit this, and we don't like this to be the case, but to some extent we need trials [00:47:00] and suffering because that goes along with our adventure.
And even if those don't come naturally, we make them happen anyway. We cause them to happen in our own lives because we're not living authentically. We try to get ourselves out of trouble, but more often than not, we just put ourselves squarely into it because we don't want to realize that whatever happens when you tell the truth is the best thing that can happen.
Truth itself brings the best possible truth and the best possible life. And it's not that lies give you more adventure than truth because truth gives you plenty of adventure. And when you're living your truthful life, then it's really happening to you and not a false you. One of the points of the lectures was that it's really quite exciting when you let go of the outcome of what happens. When you're not trying to micromanage it and control it, that's [00:48:00] when you go on a true adventure. You're not getting what you want or what you expect necessarily, you're getting something better than that. Something interesting will happen if you let go of the outcome. That's where you get real excitement, real engagement. And that's where you're intersecting with the divine nature as well, in a very real way in your life. And it is only in all of these things that can truly justify all of the misery and all of the pain and all of the things we go through in this life, because we're living into God's principles and God's purposes, and there is nothing more glorious than that.
So if Adam is the archetype of humanity, then it seems like we don't have much chance to not fall into the same pits, right?
We're all going to be sinning, [00:49:00] and we're all going to be living our inauthentic lives. This can seem really depressing and really sad and really frustrating. But I don't know about you, but to me it seems actually a bit of a relief that Adam in his imperfection is our archetype. If we were instead trying to get back to some perfect state that humanity was created in originally... well, and and don't get me wrong, we are getting into that perfect state with Christ, but Adam's perfect state is not the archetype. The fact that he sinned, that's the archetype. So because that's the archetype, all is not lost. When we sin, we can make a choice. We can return to God, or we can continue to turn away. We can live into authenticity and truth, or we can dig ourselves back into the lie. So is sin truly the [00:50:00] problem that we are all faced with? I mean, it is a problem. Is sin the thing that's keeping us from God though? Or is it non repentance that is truly the enemy here? Moving away from a lie towards and into truth... isn't that repentance? The lie is a problem in that you're not yourself. You're not functioning as the image of God. You're living falsely. That sin has its effects. But Adam and Eve, the archetypes of creation, show us that this is what we do. We sin, we fall short, and we can repent. The only real problem is when we don't repent, when we don't turn back to God.
Okay, it's time to wrap up here now. I'd kind of like to hear some feedback from you guys on what you think about archetypes and why those matter or don't matter, or how you see them and how you fit them into your own Bible study. [00:51:00] This kind of fits into the idea I've talked about before about how figurative language and metaphor are not lies. They're not untruths. And talking about the Bible with the lens of psychology and meta-narrative. That is also not lies. And I don't think we can say it's the wrong way to look at it either. If Jordan Peterson views the Bible and God through the lens of psychology, how much different really is that from any other type of application that people do? I mean, really? What could possibly be wrong with taking the Bible into the world the way you understand it? I do think we ought to start contextually understanding the Bible and doing that helps us take that further application.
I think too about the fact that the Bible is so steeped in the interests of purity. How does that figure into things? How does purity fit into the mosaic of our discipleship walk and living more into the truth and rejecting the lie? [00:52:00] biblical purity isn't just about washing with water, though it can be that. It's usually about putting something to death, burning up what was in the past to live fresh and new.
And here's a question. Does forming a biblical imagination mean that we necessarily stick to those ways that the Bible puts things? I think it's helpful to use biblical imagery, certainly, but can we say that one way to form a biblical imagination is to refit our current frameworks into biblically oriented ones? Because if that can be the case, then I don't know anyone who's doing that better than Jordan Peterson right now.
I think a big reason why we fight against the idea of archetypes in Scripture as being the primary thing that we're looking at is that we worry that that means that the Bible is fictional, that the Bible and its people are not real.
And that's a fair enough concern because it might be the case that only if something can be [00:53:00] conceptualized as real can it be truly believed. But we might be able to say that an archetype is really, really real in a sense. And sometimes for some of us, I think we could even say that it's possible that fiction can be almost as real as anything else.
Now that might seem lame. It might seem not right. I don't know. But I'm going to read a quote from Kenton Sparks from his book, Ancient Near Eastern Texts for the Study of the Bible. He talks about fiction versus history and how we can use fiction in our Bible studies and in fact how it might actually be necessary.
Sparks says,
quote,
"Neither fiction nor history necessarily has the upper hand when it comes to expressing religious truth. And this is nowhere more vividly illustrated than in the near Eastern tradition itself. Among the most interesting peculiarities of near Eastern literature is the general dearth of discourse genres. That is, texts that formally and directly treat [00:54:00] subjects in theoretical terms. The primary ancient substitute for our modern theoretical discourse was narrative, and this suggests that many ancient narratives were creative expressions of theology and ideology rather than reports of actual events."
end quote.
Now Spark admits actually, I'm gonna read this cuz it makes me laugh. He says,
quote,
"Some religious communities are naturally uncomfortable with the suggestion that portions of their Scripture may be fictional."
end quote.
I'm pretty sure I laughed out loud at that. It's like, hello, Mr. Understatement. But you see the events and the stories in the Bible, they're not arranged in a way to communicate chronological history. They're arranged to convey theological messaging.
Fiction is also structured in a way that conveys much more than what is presented. It critiques and puts on display values and beliefs.[00:55:00] It shows what someone finds important and lovable and admirable and frightening. And I'm not really saying that we have to take the story of Adam and Eve as fictional per se. I'm just saying that there are various ways that people can approach the text and still take it perfectly seriously.
For a psychologist like Jordan Peterson, a theological message could be born into a psychological meta-narrative message, and that's not losing any of its meaning. I see people ask, how do we tell truth from fiction when we do something like that? How do we rely on the Bible for truth? Well, that's the point. It's truth we're getting into as deeply as we know how to do that.
History shows us what is literally possible. It doesn't show us what is impossible because we've not yet seen all that is possible. So in a way, history is quite limited. History doesn't show boundaries or [00:56:00] feasibilities or probabilities. It only shows us possibilities that happened to have already panned out once.
Here's maybe another quote for, I hope, some comfort for some of us, again, from Sparks in his book
quote,
"We may say that history, by opening us to the different, opens us to the possible. While fiction, by opening us to the unreal opens us to the essential."
End quote.
And how does it do that? It might be because it does it through archetype, through allegory, through boiling down the truth into something that we can conceptually grasp more completely and more thoroughly than a series of data points. When we are faced with the unreal in fiction, we see something very clearly designed by someone and only the essential is included.
Isn't that what an archetype kind of is? It boils all of our truth into one essential thing, [00:57:00] the patterns that we see played out over and over. And we don't have to be nihilistic or defeatist about this because we have a God who has himself come to pattern himself into history.
Discipleship is embodied living. You can disciple yourself to the way the truth and the life. Or you are discipling yourself to something that is not that. This is also the point of ritual. It is embodied truth. You wonder why it's important for the image of God to be embodied? This is why. It's because it's discipleship. It's because it's living out our walk. It's because representation of God is a very real and concrete thing. Living out things makes them true , in a real sense, but you can't really live out a lie as truth because you're going against the grain of reality. So what you [00:58:00] end up with is not an alternate reality. It's a twisted reality. And God's creation can't stand that and God's not gonna stand that.
Way back in an early episode, maybe my first one, maybe my second one, I'm not sure. I was talking about the book Think Again. And in that book I learned about a syndrome called Anton Syndrome. And this syndrome is something where the person is oblivious to their actual physical disability. Like they're blind, but they don't know that they're blind. They think that they can actually see. They're in absolute denial of the reality of their situation and somehow their brain compensates to make them convinced that they really can see, even though they can't see .Their brain ends up confabulating. That's a good word, right? Confabulate. The word confabulate, to me it sounds like [00:59:00] it's just a, another word for lying, but that's not really what it means. To confabulate means to fill in the gaps in one's memory with fabrications that one believes to be facts. The more you live into a lie, the more you are living into confabulation, the more you are actually getting yourself to believe that what is not true is true.
This is why it requires practice. It requires depth of study. It requires prayer and reading Scripture and surrounding ourselves with good people who can influence us in the right ways. Community matters and truth matters.
All right, so here we are at the end of this episode. I do hope you enjoyed it. It was a slight bit off the beaten track, but I find it interesting [01:00:00] to see the difference in the culture of the Bible and what we have today and, and how, how differently we see it and it's hard for us to understand that there's these massive gaps. It's also interesting to try and get into the head of somebody else and how they think about the Bible. So I don't feel like that's wasted time.
And again now you know my opinion on everybody's opinion on Jordan Peterson.
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