{"id":82674,"date":"2020-02-06T23:28:48","date_gmt":"2020-02-07T06:28:48","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/admin.patheos.com\/blogs\/danpeterson\/?p=82674"},"modified":"2020-02-07T22:13:00","modified_gmt":"2020-02-08T05:13:00","slug":"reprise-harry-reid-my-brother","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/danpeterson\/2020\/02\/reprise-harry-reid-my-brother.html","title":{"rendered":"Reprise: “Harry Reid, My Brother”"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<\/head>

\u00a0<\/p>\n

\"a<\/a>
From an event at the Jordanian Embassy a number of years ago, in honor of BYU\u2019s Islamic Translation Series (later, the Middle Eastern Texts Initiative, or METI). From left to right: the late Elder Neal A. Maxwell, of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles; Ambassador Marwan Muasher; Senator and Mrs. Harry Reid; then BYU President Merrill J. Bateman; and some vagrant who must have wandered in off the street \u00a0(Photo used courtesy of BYU)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

I\u2019ve plainly angered and alienated a number of people over the past day or so because of my belief that Mitt Romney\u2019s principled and courageous vote in the Senate regarding the impeachment of President Trump is worthy of respect, regardlesss of one\u2019s stance on the <\/em>merits of his vote<\/em>.<\/p>\n

So \u2014 what the heck! \u2014 it occurs to me that I might as well resurrect a blog entry that I posted almost exactly three years ago, on 4 February 2017, that also attracted considerable wrath and invective in my direction on political grounds, although my point (as I was at pains to indicate) was never actually about politics:<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

Wherefore, I say unto you, that ye ought to forgive one another; for he that forgiveth not his brother his trespasses standeth condemned before the Lord; for there remaineth in him the greater sin. I, the Lord, will forgive whom I will forgive, but of you it is required to forgive all men. And ye ought to say in your hearts \u2014 let God judge between me and thee, and reward thee according to thy deeds.<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

Doctrine and Covenants 64:9-11<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

The horrible thing about the Two Minutes Hate was not that one was obliged to act a part, but that it was impossible to avoid joining in. Within thirty seconds any pretence was always unnecessary. A hideous ecstasy of fear and vindictiveness, a desire to kill, to torture, to smash faces in with a sledge hammer, seemed to flow through the whole group of people like an electric current, turning one even against one\u2019s will into a grimacing, screaming lunatic. And yet the rage that one felt was an abstract, undirected emotion which could be switched from one object to another like the flame of a blowlamp.<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

George Orwell, 1984<\/em><\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

I\u2019ve posted three items on this blog, I believe, over the five or six years of its existence in which I\u2019ve lamented the genuine hatred that some professed Latter-day Saints apparently feel for former United States Senator Harry Reid and the stunningly\u00a0uncharitable actions that they\u2019ve sometimes\u00a0aimed his way.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

He\u2019s a man with whom I\u2019ve very often disagreed, and a few\u00a0of whose actions I\u2019ve found deeply reprehensible. \u00a0Yet he\u2019s an active and committed Latter-day Saint to whom his\u00a0ecclesiastical leaders have repeatedly granted\u00a0a temple recommend and who was \u2014 according to what several knowledgeable sources (including two fellow senators from the opposing party and at least one apostle) have personally told me \u2014 more willing than any other Latter-day Saint senator to go to bat for the Church when its missionaries were having visa problems or when it ran into other such legal\/political obstacles, foreign and domestic.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

Each time, my posts have been met with a torrent of abusive comments (some directed at me, but by far most directed at Brother Reid). \u00a0My most recent appeal for charity and kindness\u00a0received\u00a0the usual denunciations of Senator Reid\u2019s\u00a0misdeeds and alleged crimes, of course, and the usual calls for his excommunication. \u00a0But some posters reached new heights. \u00a0One, for example, likened Brother Reid to human excrement, and another\u00a0compared him, unfavorably, to an unpleasant bowel movement. \u00a0Some other commenters have approved of these analogies.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

As we\u2019re approaching the evening before the Sabbath, I think it appropriate to post a warning. \u00a0But first, I\u2019d like to cite a passage from the Savior\u2019s Sermon on the Mount, as it\u2019s recorded in Matthew 5:<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

21\u00a0<\/span>Ye have heard that it was said by them of old time, Thou\u00a0shalt\u00a0not\u00a0kill; and whosoever shall kill shall be\u00a0in danger of the judgment:<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

<\/a>\u00a022\u00a0<\/span>But I say unto you, That whosoever is\u00a0angry\u00a0with his brother\u00a0without a cause\u00a0shall be\u00a0in\u00a0danger of the judgment: and whosoever shall say to his brother,\u00a0Raca, shall be\u00a0in\u00a0danger of the council: but whosoever shall say, Thou fool, shall be in danger of hell fire.<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

Here\u2019s a brief\u00a0discussion of that passage that I encourage my readers to look at:<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

https:\/\/www.gotquestions.org\/raca.html<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

And, lest some respond that they have<\/em> \u201ccause\u201d to be angry with Harry Reid, and that it\u2019s therefore alright to verbally abuse him, I would like to point out that the phrase without a cause<\/em> is absent from many ancient versions of Matthew 5:22, as well as from the equivalent verses in both the Book of Mormon and the Joseph Smith Translation of the Bible, and that without a cause<\/em>\u00a0may well have been a self-interested later scribal addition intended to soften the Savior\u2019s condemnation of anger and angry name-calling:<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

https:\/\/rsc-legacy.byu.edu\/archived\/selected-articles\/adding-and-taking-away-without-cause-matthew-522<\/a><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

I\u2019m reminded, too, of a solemn covenant\u00a0that many of us have made, in which we promised to refrain from speaking evil of the Lord\u2019s anointed. \u00a0In a very real and literal sense, Brother Harry Reid is numbered among them.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

\"The<\/a>
The Washington DC Temple is one of many such sanctuaries in which faithful Latter-day Saints of widely varying political views have worshiped together since the early years of the Restoration.
(LDS Media Library)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

Now, here\u2019s my warning: \u00a0I\u2019m asking those who continue to feel that they must publicly accuse Brother\u00a0Reid of criminal acts, post public condemnations of his character and personality, and\/or compare him to human feces or the like, to get it out of their systems \u2014 at least as pertains to my blog and my Facebook page \u2014 before the dawn of the Sabbath. \u00a0I will delete the comment of anyone who posts such a thing on my blog or on my Facebook page tomorrow, on Sunday, and I will permanently block that person from ever posting anything at all in either of those places again.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

I really find such things disgusting.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

As one commenter put it just a few minutes ago, \u201cThose lamenting that Reid is being judged harshly \u2014 fairly or not \u2014 are overlooking the fact that Reid himself was guilty of the same harsh judgement in pursuit of his own venal interests. \u00a0No \u2014 Reid happily sowed the wind, and is now reaping the whirlwind. . . . \u00a0Reid is not deserving of our pity, nor is he entitled \u2014 without abject and contrite repentance \u2014 to our absolution of his sins. . . . \u00a0[W]e are under no obligation (divine or otherwise) to pretend that he is anything other than an unrepentant, unremorseful, and boastful sinner.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

I guess that I had never realized that \u201cabsolution of sins\u201d was ours either to give or to withhold.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cWith what judgment ye judge,\u201d said the Savior in his Sermon on the Mount, \u201cye shall be judged: and with what measure ye mete, it shall be measured to you again\u201d (Matthew 7:2).<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

There will be no clemency for\u00a0anybody who posts any such thing on my blog or on my Facebook page tomorrow, on the Sabbath. \u00a0That person will be given the boot, permanently. \u00a0There will be a break from the hatefest for at least the duration of the Sabbath day.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

Please note that I\u2019m not saying that criticism of Senator Reid\u2019s record is off-limits. \u00a0I myself am a very serious political conservative, and I probably would not have voted for him had I lived in Nevada. \u00a0(His considerable utility to the Church and his value in demonstrating that active American Latter-day Saints can be vocal Democrats as well as Republicans would have been the only considerations\u00a0to give me pause.) \u00a0I\u2019m talking about expressions of the toxic personal contempt and the ardent eagerness to condemn others that have come to poison and deform our political discourse and that, in my very serious judgment, have no place whatever within the Kingdom of God.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

I won\u2019t have them.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

Thank you, and I wish everybody a wonderful weekend and a pleasant Sabbath day.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\u00a0 \u00a0 I\u2019ve plainly angered and alienated a number of people over the past day or so because of my belief that Mitt Romney\u2019s principled and courageous vote in the Senate regarding the impeachment of President Trump is worthy of respect, regardlesss of one\u2019s stance on the merits of his vote. So \u2014 what the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1019,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[2637,2655,8265,2905,1812,8262],"class_list":["post-82674","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-charity","tag-civility","tag-harry","tag-latter-day-saint","tag-latter-day-saints","tag-reid"],"yoast_head":"\nReprise: "Harry Reid, My Brother"<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"    I've plainly angered and alienated a number of people over the past day or so because of my belief that Mitt Romney's principled and\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/danpeterson\/2020\/02\/reprise-harry-reid-my-brother.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" 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