"Why do the heathen rage...against the Lord and his anointed...?" Why indeed? Exactly where does this endless bile-soaked, intemperate, irrational, compulsive rage come from, and what is the point?... other than mindless hatred?

 

Has anyone noticed the rage? The psalmist did and asks incredulously: "Why...?" There is today, as there has been since ancient times, altogether too much rage directed at the heavens to explain in rational terms. It draws embarrassing attention to the vehement ragers, begging the question: why? 

 

The psalmist seems shaken in observing the soul-searing rage against God and notes from whom it comes: the heathen, or nations (the common people), and the kings and rulers of the earth (the in-control elite). In other words, it comes from the haves and have-nots, those at the top and those at the bottom of the order. It emanates from the literate and the illiterate, the politically astute and the unwashed: rage is ubiquitous and is an equal-opportunity, egalitarian depravity. 

 

Even some liberal journalists have been jarred by the hideous level of animosity and rage emanating from their own political and cultural camps. Damon Linker, a senior editor for The Week, a resoundingly ultra-liberal e-magazine, has seen the rage and like the psalmist, he basically asks: "What on earth is going on here?" that is, "Why?"  He notes:

 

"Liberalism seems to have an irrational animus against Christianity."  

 

He further indites:

 

"...contemporary liberalism's irrational animus against religion in general and traditional forms of Christianity in particular."

 

"An irrational animus" is rage. Mr. Linker uses the loaded phrase twice and wonders why liberals have developed such a festering, unrelenting hatred toward Christianity in particular.  Here is another of his quotes:

 

"Why do so many liberals despise Christianity? Liberals increasingly want to enforce a comprehensive, uniformly secular vision of the human good. And they see alternative visions of the good as increasingly intolerable."  

 

Intolerable? Isn't that a bad word in liberal circles when applied to ideas? Are these the same free-thinkers who mouth sanctimonious rhetoric about inclusion and tolerance toward others who may think differently? Linker notes this towering hypocrisy and asks with perplexity:

 

"What happened to a liberalism of skepticism, modesty, humility, and openness to conflicting notions of the highest good? What happened to a liberalism of pluralism that recognizes that when people are allowed to search for truth in freedom, they are liable to seek and find it in a multitude of values, beliefs, and traditions? What happened to a liberalism that sees this diversity as one of the finest flowers of a free society rather than a threat to the liberal democratic order?"

 

What happened to all these traditional liberal values? They have been layered over with a green patina of rage. Linker goes on to express a profound regret that rage has consumed the minds and principles of modern liberalism. He includes himself in on the problem as a fellow liberal by using the pronoun "we," and laments:

 

"I don't have answers to these questions — and frankly, not a lot hinges on figuring out how we got here. What matters is that we acknowledge that something in the liberal mind has changed, and that we act to recover what has been lost."

 

Mr. Linker is correct. The "liberal mind" has changed — for the worse.  The concept of free thinking that embraces inclusion and tolerance is sick and dying. The liberal new order is of a limited, parceled-out tolerance, but it does not include traditional conservative Christians, who liberals now see and describe as their stone enemies to be opposed, slandered, and beaten back at every turn in the political and cultural road like they were a zombie uprising. The "liberal mind" has turned on tolerance and replaced it with a "believe-as-I-do-or-die" rage.  Previously tolerant liberalism is now the New Inquisition.

 

Of course, when one piously intones a liberal credo that is built on tolerance for opposing views, and then excludes certain groups that are deemed "unworthy," at that exclusion, tolerance dies for everyone. Mr. Linker realizes this contradiction and is fully aware of the sad fact that "modern liberalism" has lost its intolerant soul, and that lost soul is engulfed in rage. Modern religion-hating liberals are consumed with rage against the Lord, his anointed, and all those who believe in these two members of the Godhead. 

 

But wait... the psalmist has in fact asked a rhetorical question in asking: "Why do the heathen (and kings and rulers) rage..." against the Lord?  The ancient psalmist knows the answer as do many today. Mr. Linker is only slightly off in his views if he presumes that this unmitigated, mindless and counterproductive liberal rage is a modern phenomenon. It is as old as humankind and the rage mentioned in Psalms 2 is the exact same rage we see today, and it is rotting away the values of modern liberalism.

 

Mr. Linker cites an example of this "irrational animus" that has infected the liberal mindset. He sees an astonishing virulent hatred toward Christian medical missionaries. These are doctors and nurses who have given up a comfortable life in the U.S. to spend impoverished, over-worked, dangerous lives in obscure anonymity caring for the desperately ill in underdeveloped nations. 

 

Linker notes that this corrosive hatred toward Christian medical missionaries isn't because they are frauds, or aren't doing a good work with their medical care; but it is solely because they are Christians: the overriding liberal fear is they may (gasp) mention God. In other words, to a modern liberal in the throes of hatred and rage, the mere act of mentioning God negates any good the missionaries may be doing, and nothing counts except silencing anyone from talking about non-approved subjects such as God. Here are Linker's quotes:

 

"In a widely discussed essay in Slate, author Brian Palmer writes about the prevalence of missionary doctors and nurses in Africa and their crucial role in treating those suffering from Ebola.  Palmer... expresses 'ambivalence,' 'suspicion,' and 'visceral discomfort' about the fact that these men and women are motivated to make 'long-term commitments to address the health problems of poor Africans,' to 'risk their lives,' and to accept poor compensation (and sometimes none at all), and they do all this because of their Christian faith. The question is why [Palmer] considers this a problem."

 

It wouldn't be a problem to any fair-minded liberal, regardless of his/her religious position; it's only a problem to someone under the domination of rage. Note that the skeptic above has these negative, dismissive reactions toward Christian medical missionaries: "ambivalence, suspicion, and visceral discomfort." Note that the reactions are not thankfulness, joy, and relief that people are being helped. No, merely because they are Christians, all gratefulness dissipates and becomes suspicion and discomfort. This is irrational animus.

 

Linker states the preposterous reason that Palmer cannot appreciate Christian medical missionaries, no matter how many good works are being done and lives being saved:

 

"The real reason is that he doesn't believe that missionaries are capable 'of separating their religious work from their medical work,' even when they vow not to proselytize their patients.  And that, in his view, is unacceptable — apparently because he's an atheist and religion creeps him out.  As he puts it, rather wanly, 'It's great that these people are doing God's work, but do they have to talk about Him so much?'''

 

Palmer is an atheist and religion creeps him out — who cares, really? — but that's the modern liberal rationale for seething hatred today, and that was precisely the reason for the rage in the psalmist's day, 2600 years ago: hatred of religion — rage against the heavens.  It consumes everything that is good and praiseworthy and reduces the ragers to hatemongers who tolerate no one who would dare disobey the ragers' edict to not breathe a word about God. And this on pain of death, perhaps, depending on the amount of political and legal impunity the ragers are able to consolidate.

 

So, what is the answer to the psalmist's question of "why?" Why do the nations so furiously rage together (Handel's Messiah version)?  The answer is simple and transcends the ages. It is the same answer for all ragers toward God and his Anointed. Hatred of God is built into the depraved natures of humankind and is part and parcel of the fallen race. In this respect, it is determined upon humans to hate God and the idea of God. It is one of the results of the fall of humankind and is an evil step-sister of the besetting sin of the ages: pride.

 

Rage toward God is part of the human condition and can only be alleviated by that same God. Rage is only healed by reconciliation between humankind and the Creator. Sans that healing, rage continues and makes normally rational and educated people hate good-hearted medical missionaries merely because they are Christians and might do the unspeakable while saving lives: mention the name of God.  

 

Jesus ("his anointed") in the New Testament also mentions this debilitating rage with these words:

 

"If the world hates you, keep in mind that it hated me first." John 15:18

 

Again, it is the world (nations, kings and rulers) that hated Jesus first, and without rational reason, much like despising healers in faraway lands because they believe the "wrong" things, according to the new intolerant tyranny of modern liberalism.

 

Psalms 2 goes on to say: 

 

"The kings of the earth set themselves, and the rulers take counsel together, against the LORD, and against his anointed, saying, Let us break their bands asunder, and cast away their cords from us."

 

Here we have the rage refined to its core element: rebellion against God and against his Anointed. The nations and their rulers demand that any bands and cords, which connect them with God, be broken. Humankind is in a history-long rage to escape God and his authority and laws. The rage is high rebellion. The reason a man who has stayed in the U.S and enjoys his daily lattes can hate a verified do-gooder battling the Ebola virus in Africa, is that this Christian missionary is a symbol, an emissary, a reminder of God, and the rage kicks in with all of its ugliness and irrationality. 

 

Do you see uncontrolled rage all around you because you are a person of faith? It is supposed to be there and should be no surprise, nor should it be of any concern. The ragers are likely reprobate and can no longer control their minds in this regard, and Christians are permitted to have an expansive disinterest in it all. The psalmist wasn't surprised in asking "why?" This literary device barely masks the psalmist's deep understanding of the reason for the rage: God and humankind are estranged, and if there has been no reconciliation, that estrangement produces rage in those who have not come to be healed of their hatred.

 

What happens to the ragers? The psalmist invokes the only mention in all of scripture of laughter coming from the Deity. This divine laughter, however, is sardonic and not a laugh of joy and happiness. It is a laugh of scorn, v. 4:

 

"He that sitteth in the heavens shall laugh: the Lord shall have them in derision."

 

The ultimate fate of unreconciled God-haters is also revealed in v. 9. The Psalmist says of the laughing God:

 

"Thou shalt break them with a rod of iron; thou shalt dash them in pieces like a potter's vessel."

 

I submit that most ragers who read this chilling fate may be so filled with an extra, atomically heavy rage that they could have a coronary. We believers are not sanctioned to join God in his laugh of derision at the ragers, though perhaps we are tempted to do so. That ominous laugh is reserved for the Judge of the Nations. The battle belongs to the Lord and we below cannot participate. The limit of our reaction to the endless, tiresome and uncivil bigotry from ragers is patient waiting and a measured opposition to all injustices. God will sort us all out.  

 

Meanwhile I must refrain, as I should, from scornfully laughing at the ragers, but I do note them with sober bemusement, I understand the "why" of it, and I move serenely and joyfully on in life. Simply put, I don't care if there are raging reprobates shaking their fists at the heavens. As long as the haters continue to fail to consolidate the requisite political and legal power to hunt me down and execute me for my beliefs, my disinterest in their rage is chasmous. Believers are also allowed to shake off the dust collected from any rager locale. There are many more waiting down the road who are ready for the message of reconciliation and hate eradication. That useless rage-dust need not weigh one down in the journey. God will attend to the ragers as he sees fit. They are His concern, not ours.

 

Michael Roy

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