Through the years, I've dug into lots of contradictory statements of preachers I've known. Dr. Sightler, the president of the Bible college I first attended when I got out of high school and lots of preachers since have said, "Pay your taxes" and "render to Caesar what is Caesar's" and the like; concepts that many pastors since have identified as Marxist and anti-Christian.
Even Mahatma Gandhi flirted with the idea of taxing the super rich in excess of 70% in one of his books.
But Leo Tolstoy, a Christian anarchist, brought it all together for me. Tolstoy was the seminal thinker in Gandhian Philosophy, being the author of the book, The Kingdom Of God Is Within You, attributed with transforming the lawyer M. K. Gandhi into the Mahatma (Great Soul) of India.
Tolstoy showed how that a Christian is not a proponent of the Law of Moses, who brought temporal law, instructed to pluck out eyes, condemned to death at every turn, etc. Rather, a Christian follows Jesus' instruction to "render not evil for evil," "judge not" (do not make legal determinations of others), "go not to law," " condemn not" (impose not the death penalty), etc. A Christian is instead a person who follows the Sermon on the Mount (Matthew 5-7), recognizing that the Law of Moses is under glass like a Texas rattle snake ("abrogated"). You can see it, but it has no more bite.
This is what Dr. King meant when he said, "The last Christian died a long time ago." The last person who followed the eternal law of Jesus and not the temporal law of Moses died a long time ago.
In the same manor, pastors have wrongly been focussing Americans on concepts that were being changed before the apostles' eyes at the Sermon on the Mount. Caesar is a dead man in Rome, not a government concept to be followed in the Kingdom conception of life. Jesus sought to abolish the state conception of life when he said, "Swear not." He went so far past the tax issue in that mountainside sermon that there would be no tax concept in the Kingdom conception of life.
Some will say that the Kingdom is a future conception. I say that one should consider what the Kingdom conception of life is made of, and then make your determination on time frames. Do you think Jesus sought to return to earth one day to then instruct man to "go not to law?", or is "go not to law" something his followers could and should do today? Should man "render not evil for evil" in some future time, or is it for now? Did Jesus say, "condemn not" (impose not the death penalty) to the men waiting to stone to death the woman taken in adultery, offering no other person that mercy for thousands of years?, or did he want his followers to condemn not from 2000 years ago forward?
Jesus did not say, "The Kingdom Of God Will Come With Me." He said, "The Kingdom Of God Is Within You." It "IS" (present tense "within you"). For the Christians, it is the Kingdom, I propose in my campaign. For some, it is the Age of Aquarius, I propose. For the rest of us, it is the closest thing to peace on earth we could ever hope for that I propose in my campaign. Join me, and let us have peace from within.
My Five Point Plan if Elected Texas Governor
1) Swear not/ Do not take oaths (ends the state and all its systems of violence).
2) Lay not up for yourselves treasures on earth (mitigates envy and covetousness and refocusses life on the family and community).
3) Render not evil for evil (ends war).
4) Go not to law (ends the legal system).
5) Judge not, condemn not (ends bigotry, discrimination, the prison system and the death penalty).
Conclusion: Peace on earth.
Gene Chapman,
Tolstoyan-Gandhian Libertarian Candidate for Texas Governor
(Endorsed by Dr. Noam Chomsky, Intellectual of the Age)
ChapmanForTexasGovernor2014.com
gkchapman2012@hotmail.com
