Experience as a tool in doing Christian Social Ethics Reflection Paper

Introduction Christian ethics is an important discipline in doing theology as this engages in the practical life situations of a person, community and society in relation to Christian faith, doctrines and principles. The epistemological understanding of Christian ethics can be possible through different sources such as Scripture, Tradition and Experience. Among the three sources of doing Christian ethics, experience is significant. In this reflection paper, a focus is made on understanding the aspect of experience as an important source for doing Christian Social Ethics. Christian Ethics: the analytical definition of Christian ethics is, it is the practical principle that deals with what is right for a person to desire and what is not (Summum Bonum), what a person should do and what one should not (Duty) and what moral power is needed to arrive at an end and realize the duty (Virtue).1 Experience: The term experience can be defined as that which signifies the practical acquaintance gained by trial or experiment and also the fruit of knowledge so obtained.2 This can be understood in a twofold spiritual sense as the one that would indicate to have proper awareness of the communion with the spirit in the present and the other as wisdom acquired by understanding the spiritual facts derived from inner and outer worlds.3 The above definitions suggest the inter-relatedness of the expected Christian life and the human experience, as Christian social ethics would demand. It is the experience that helps, teaches and guides a person to discern with relation to the scripture and tradition, upon the ethical issues that he/she faces or will have to face. Scripture and tradition to a larger extent would only help to understand and react to the ethical issues faces in a deontological perspective, which would not help to grapple with issues that emerge in various contexts. However, the importance of scripture and tradition cannot be superimposed by experience,

James Hastings, ed., Encyclopedia of Religion and Ethics, vol.2, (New York: Charles Scribners Sons, 1908), 469. 2 James Hastings, ed., Encyclopedia of Religion and Ethics, vol.2, (New York: Charles Scribners Sons, 1908), 630. 3 James Hastings, ed., Encyclopedia of Religion and Ethics, vol.2, (New York: Charles Scribners Sons, 1908), 630.

but can surely give the wisdom needed to rightly discern with the issues pertaining to Christian ethics. Scripture and Experience: Scripture, which provides the text which is only a narrative with a self-contained world of meaning, the claims made in it cannot be applicable to those experiences external to the text. It is important to remember that the text itself has emerged out of certain spiritual and living experiences of people.4 Such a text invites contemporary response through its own power to evoke new and saving meaning in the realm of experience that the reader brings.5 In his cultural-linguistic model, George Lindbeck opines that the religious experience is possible through the external language to express the inner experience of God.6 This further can be understood that it is the experience within a human person that formulates the religious within oneself and would express through a language. In such case any text that suitably addresses the issue can be considered as scripture. This would certainly invite trouble from the Christian fundamental religious forces. We should be conscious about the inflictions made by the fundamental/literal understanding of the bible through the centuries of Christianity. The oppression of poor, terrible violence and execution of the heretics and justification of the hierarchy are but few such. the scenario of the present day is not much different as we see the discrimination on women who are still kept away from the high office in the church, discrimination among people on the basis of caste, class and sexual orientation and the attempt to bring the end to the world with nuclear Armageddon. 7 As it is rightly argued by feminist biblical scholars like Mary Daly and Daphne Hampson, that Scripture is irredeemably patriarchal.8 It is thus obvious that scripture has itself been subverted by reactionary readings, held prisoner by authoritarian ideologies but, like all texts, ait can resist its interpreters and find its own voice. Ever and again its strange new voice can be heard. 9 This attempt was made by feminist Christian exegetes like Phyllis Trible, Fiorenza and others who re-read and re-

Robert Gascoigne, The Public Forum & Christian Ethics, (Cambridge: The Press Syndicate of the University of Cambridge, 2001), 118. 5 Robert Gascoigne, The Public Forum & Christian Ethics, (Cambridge: The Press Syndicate of the University of Cambridge, 2001), 119. 6 Robert Gascoigne, The Public Forum & Christian Ethics, (Cambridge: The Press Syndicate of the University of Cambridge, 2001), 119. 7 Timothy Gorringe, Scripture and subversion, in Light on Our Dusty Path, edited by Israel Selvanayagam (Bangalore: BTESSC / SATHRI, 2008), 78. 8 Timothy Gorringe, Scripture and subversion, in Light on Our Dusty Path, edited by Israel Selvanayagam (Bangalore: BTESSC / SATHRI, 2008), 81. 9 Timothy Gorringe, Scripture and subversion, in Light on Our Dusty Path, edited by Israel Selvanayagam (Bangalore: BTESSC / SATHRI, 2008), 85.

interpreted the biblical texts, showing through thei experiences of oppression, intimidation, violence and struggles that domination is opposed in the bible in various levels.10 Is it not out of the experiences of the so called black, the alienated, the dalit and adivasis, the women and other oppressed sections of the society that the Liberation Theologies emerged? Is it not their experiences that created the compulsion to derive hermeneutical principles to re-read and re-interpret the scripture which usually is understood in literal sense to authenticate the dominant oppressive structures? This is not just to make the Gospel message conform to the needs of different groups of people suffering from one or the other form of oppression... but rather to interpret the suffering experience...11 Tradition and Experience: Tradition is modelled from the social life structures and religious norms to keep the practices and beliefs intact and is transferred through centuries. The Christian tradition has inherited the imperial structure once the early church embraced the Roman imperialism. The royal religion no more could give priority to the oppressed and vulnerable of the communities as it should have given because of the blend of the elements the Jewish notion of the chosen and the Roman dominance. The church in hte following years has become traditionally violent and oppressive. He experiences of the reformers overtook the traditional church structures and the reform is desperately needed today. In the ethical perspective tradition may be of some help in ethical discernments but not a complete norm especially when tradition advocates the inequality of gender, class and caste, injustice, oppression and dominance. Personal and communal experiences demand the relocation of the vantage point of tradition which is inevitable. In such case, the human experience would become the lens to look at the scripture and tradition and appropriate with the context of the living experiences. This process includes rejection, alteration and emancipation from the mutilated and distorted imperatives that are normative in ethical discernment. The focus on situation ethics could help us to draw further inferences. situation Ethics, the term appeared in Joseph Flechers book by the same title, in which he argues that Christians must steer between old authoritarianisms, whether biblical or ecclesiastical, and the unstructured posture of existentialism12 had been a controversy ever since. This concept of
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Timothy Gorringe, Scripture and subversion, in Light on Our Dusty Path, edited by Israel Selvanayagam (Bangalore: BTESSC / SATHRI, 2008), 81. 11 Robert Bruce McLaren, Christian Ethics: Foundations and Practice, (New Jersey: Prentice Hall, 1994), 91. 12 Robert Bruce McLaren, Christian Ethics: Foundations and Practice, (New Jersey: Prentice Hall, 1994), 72

doing Christian ethics focuses on love and is of three fold: first, it emphasises on individual responsibility in decision making where no excuse can be made by pointing at any institution, family, state, church or other agency, to have compelled to such decision making second, while responding to situations, with love as guide, legalism or rule ethics is rejected which is similar to Karl Barths actualism Bonhoeffers response to Hitlers tyranny and Niebuhrs appeal to the perfectionist love ethic of Jesus- third, inevitable relativism, that is to act according to a situation as love may require to.13 Despite many criticisms of this model, with a focus to understand experience as an important source of doing Christian ethics, it helps to react to ethical issues out of ones own experience to discern the morality of the issue. It is often that to be ethical in ones own conscience is to be immoral to the existing structures. This attitude defies the deontological ethics and offers individual responsibility to live an ethical life that would unfold itself with ones own experience. Conclusion Appropriating the scripture and tradition to the experiences of individual and community to envision the egalitarian society, the Kingdom of God, would help effectively in doing Christian ethics. Viewing the scripture and tradition as sources for doing Christian ethics requires experience as the lens.

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Robert Bruce McLaren, Christian Ethics: Foundations and Practice, (New Jersey: Prentice Hall, 1994), 72