{"id":8643,"date":"2016-09-02T17:58:04","date_gmt":"2016-09-02T21:58:04","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/admin.patheos.com\/blogs\/davearmstrong\/?p=8643"},"modified":"2017-02-24T16:03:00","modified_gmt":"2017-02-24T20:03:00","slug":"spanking-bible-pope-francis","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/davearmstrong\/2016\/09\/spanking-bible-pope-francis.html","title":{"rendered":"Spanking: Bible & Pope Francis"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<\/head>

\"Jesus38\"<\/p>\n

Jesus administered corporal punishment with a whip: Christ expulses the money changers out of the temple <\/i>(1610), by Cecco del Caravaggio (follower of the famous Caravaggio; fl. 1610-1620s)<\/span> [public domain \/ Wikimedia Commons<\/a>]<\/p>\n

*****<\/p>\n

Today it is quite fashionable and chic to commit the \u201cthrow the baby out with the bathwater\u201d fallacy and to believe that every form of disciplinary spanking is child-beating: as if a little swat on a butt is the same as a punch in the mouth, slap on the face, etc. That\u2019s self-evidently absurd, and requires no rational argument to overthrow, but it is widespread, because many people approach this issue from an emotional perspective only, while discarding\u00a0the necessity for rational analysis.<\/p>\n

One of the things that vehement opponents of spanking overlook is clear biblical evidence in favor of it:<\/p>\n

Proverbs 13:24<\/strong>\u00a0(RSV) He who spares the rod<\/span> hates his son, but he who loves him is diligent to discipline him.<\/p>\n

Proverbs 22:15<\/strong> Folly is bound up in the heart of a child,\u00a0but the rod<\/span> of discipline drives it far from him.<\/p>\n

Proverbs 23:13-14<\/strong> Do not withhold discipline from a child;\u00a0if you beat him with a rod<\/span>, he will not die.\u00a0[14] If you beat him with the rod\u00a0<\/span>you will save his life from Sheol. (cf. Heb 12:5-11; Eph 6:14)<\/p>\n

Proverbs\u00a029:15<\/strong> The rod<\/span> and reproof give wisdom,\u00a0but a child left to himself brings shame to his mother.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Some argue that these passages are not to be taken literally, and\/or that to do so is merely \u201cfundamentalism.\u201d But there are, of course, many literal passages in Holy Scripture (if not the vast majority). The trick is to know which<\/em> ones are literal and which aren\u2019t<\/em>. The error of fundamentalism is to take things literally when they weren\u2019t intended<\/em>\u00a0(by the standard rules of literary and biblical interpretation, or hermeneutics), to be such.<\/p>\n

The Keil & Delitzsch Commentary on the Old Testament<\/a><\/em> is one of the most revered works of this sort: written by two German Lutheran scholars and Hebraists. Assuredly, they understand Hebrew literary genres and when a passage is intended to be literal or not. Franz Delitzsch converted from Judaism to Lutheranism at age 19 in 1832. According to their commentary, these passages are quite literal:<\/p>\n

Proverbs 23:14 commentary<\/a>: \u201c. . .\u00a0he who administers corporal<\/em><\/strong> chastisement to the child, saves him spiritually . . .\u201d [my emphasis]<\/p>\n

Proverbs 29:15 commentary:<\/a> \u201c. . .\u00a0discipline by means of words, which must accompany bodily discipline<\/em><\/strong>, and without them is also necessary . . .\u201d\u00a0[my emphasis]<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Gesenius\u2019 Hebrew and Chaldee Lexicon to the Old Testament Scriptures<\/em> concurs as to the Hebrew word for rod<\/em> in all four of the passages above: shebet<\/em> (Strong\u2019s word #7626<\/a>):<\/p>\n

. . . a staff<\/em>, stick<\/em>, rod<\/em> . . . (1) used for beating or striking, Isa. 10:15; 14:5; and chastening (virga<\/em>), Prov. 10:13; 13:24; 22:8 . . .<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

A Catholic Commentary on Holy Scripture<\/em><\/a> (London: Thomas Nelson and Sons Ltd, edited by Dom Bernard Orchard, 1953) is not some flaming fundamentalist commentary, either, but a respected Catholic work. It refers to the description in Proverbs 23:13-14 as \u201ccorporal punishment.\u201d<\/p>\n

Lest someone argue that all this is antiquated Old Testament \/ Hebrew teaching that doesn\u2019t apply to us today, I would note three things:<\/p>\n

1) The Old Testament is just as inspired as the New Testament, and Christian theology developed from it. Spanking is not an element of Jewish law (Mosaic Law) that Christians aren\u2019t bound to.<\/p>\n

2) The New Testament alludes to very similar ideas in its comparisons of a father\u2019s discipline of his children to God\u2019s discipline (Hebrews 12:5-11).<\/p>\n

3) We also see Jesus Himself administering corporal punishment<\/em> to the moneychangers at the temple:<\/p>\n

John 2:14-15<\/strong>\u00a0In the temple he found those who were selling oxen and sheep and pigeons, and the money-changers at their business. [15] And making a whip of cords<\/span>, he drove them all, with the sheep and oxen, out of the temple; and he poured out the coins of the money-changers and overturned their tables.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

<\/p>\n

Catholic apologist Jimmy Akin \u2014 characteristically \u2014 \u00a0wrote a balanced, reasonable, non-legalistic treatment on the issue as spanking<\/a> (May 2011), noting that he was unaware of any magisterial teaching forbidding it:<\/p>\n

My own conviction is that the issue of corporal punishment is one for parents to decide. I have known some parents who have successfully raised children using it seldom or never. I also know there are parents who feel it is has played an important and needed role in raising their children. The fact is that children are different, and some respond to different things. To one child a time out may be far more agonizing (and motivating) than a paddling. To others just the reverse will be the case. Whether corporal punishment is to be used in the case of their own children\u2014and how much and when\u2014is something that I view as within the natural law rights of the parents.<\/p>\n

. . .\u00a0I think reasonable people can have a legitimate diversity of opinion.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Fellow Catholic Answers apologist Michelle Arnold, writing for EWTN<\/a> (11-13-08), concurred that the Church has not decided one way or another:<\/p>\n

Spanking of children is a highly controversial issue that the Church has not explicitly addressed. . . .<\/p>\n

Basically, the Church does not have an official stance on corporal punishment, leaving it to the prudential judgment of parents based on known Christian principles.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Akin\u00a0also commented on the moneychangers passage above:<\/p>\n

It\u2019s easy to say that it\u2019s hard to imagine Jesus paddling someone, just as it\u2019s easy to suppose that he wouldn\u2019t splatter people\u2019s money, overturn their property, and physically attack a group of businessmen. Surely the meek and mild Jesus would never<\/em> do those things! Our God is a God of order, not chaos, after all. And violence never solves anything.<\/p>\n

Yet here we have the Savior of mankind brandishing a whip.<\/em><\/p>\n

It seems like Jesus might be willing to paddle quite a few people.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

In a second article<\/a> on the topic, Akin also produced a sanction of corporal punishment from none other than Pope Francis, in his General Audience of 4 February 2015<\/a>:<\/p>\n

A good father\u00a0knows how to wait and knows how to forgive\u00a0<\/i>from the depths of his heart.<\/p>\n

Certainly, he also knows how to correct with firmness: he is not a weak father, submissive and sentimental.<\/p>\n

The father who\u00a0knows how to correct without humiliating\u00a0<\/i>is the one who knows how to protect without sparing himself.<\/p>\n

Once I heard a father at a meeting on marriage say:<\/p>\n

\u201cSometimes I have to strike the children lightly\u2026 but never in the face so as not to humiliate them\u201d.<\/p>\n

How beautiful! He has a sense of dignity. He must punish, but he does it in a just way, and moves on [emphasis in original].<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

For further related reading, see my earlier articles:<\/strong><\/p>\n

Spanking is Not \u201cBeating\u201d and is Sanctioned by the Bible, the Catechism, and American College of Pediatricians<\/a> (+ Part Two<\/a>) [1-26-08; Internet Archive posts; allow a minute or two to load]<\/p>\n

The Great Spanking Debate Revisited<\/a> [2-6-14]<\/p>\n

*****<\/p>\n

Meta Description:\u00a0The Bible has some explicit passages about corporal punishment of children (spanking), & Pope Francis also condoned it.<\/p>\n

Meta Keywords:\u00a0Childrearing, corporal punishment, spanking, parental authority, parental discipline, chastisement, parenting<\/p>\n

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Jesus administered corporal punishment with a whip: Christ expulses the money changers out of the temple (1610), by Cecco del Caravaggio (follower of the famous Caravaggio; fl. 1610-1620s) [public domain \/ Wikimedia Commons] ***** Today it is quite fashionable and chic to commit the \u201cthrow the baby out with the bathwater\u201d fallacy and to believe […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2331,"featured_media":8644,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[289],"tags":[3223,825,823,827,824,826,822],"class_list":["post-8643","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-political-ethical-moral-issues","tag-chastisement","tag-childrearing","tag-corporal-punishment","tag-parental-authority","tag-parental-discipline","tag-parenting","tag-spanking"],"yoast_head":"\nSpanking: Bible & Pope Francis<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"The 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Formerly a campus missionary, as a Protestant, Dave was received into the Catholic Church in February 1991, by the late, well-known catechist and theologian, Fr. John A. Hardon, S. J. Dave\u2019s articles have appeared in many influential Catholic periodicals, including \"This Rock\" (now called \"Catholic Answers Magazine\"), \"Envoy Magazine\" (Patrick Madrid), \"The Catholic Answer,\" \"The Coming Home Journal,\" \"Gilbert Magazine\" (American Chesterton Society), and \"The Latin Mass.\" He also writes a featured column for every issue of \"The Michigan Catholic\": published by the archdiocese of Detroit, and was editor for most of the apologetics tracts published by the St. Paul Street Evangelization apostolate. Dave\u2019s apologetics and writing apostolate was the subject of a feature article in the May 2002 issue of \"Envoy Magazine.\" He served as the staff moderator at the Internet discussion forum for The Coming Home Network, from 2007-2010. Dave has been interviewed on many nationally syndicated Catholic radio shows, including \"Catholic Answers Live\" (twice), \"Faith and Family Live\" (Steve Wood), \"Kresta in the Afternoon,\" \"Son Rise Morning Show,\" \"Catholic Connection\" (Teresa Tomeo), and \"The Catholics Next Door.\" His large and popular website, \"Biblical Evidence for Catholicism,\" was online from March 1997 to March 2007, and received the 1998 Catholic Website of the Year award from \"Envoy Magazine.\" His blog of the same name (now transferred to Patheos), begun in February 2004, contains more than 1,500 papers, at least 500 debates or dialogues, and over 50 distinct \"index\" web pages. Unsolicited correspondence has indicated many hundreds of conversions (or returns) to the Catholic faith as a result, by God's grace, of these writings. Dave's conversion story was published in the bestselling book \"Surprised by Truth\" (edited by Patrick Madrid; San Diego: Basilica Press, 1994). Sophia Institute Press has published six of his books: \"A Biblical Defense of Catholicism\" (Foreword by Fr. John A. Hardon, S. J., 1996 \/ 2003), \"The Catholic Verses\" (2004), \"The One-Minute Apologist\" (2007), \"Bible Proofs for Catholic Truths\" (2009), \"The Quotable Newman\" (editor: 2012), and \"Proving the Catholic Faith is Biblical\" (2015). He is co-author (with Dr. Paul Thigpen) of the inserts for \"The New Catholic Answer Bible\" (Our Sunday Visitor: 2005), and editor for \"The Wisdom of Mr. Chesterton: The Very Best Quotes, Quips, and Cracks from the Pen of G. K. Chesterton\" (Saint Benedict Press \/ TAN Books: 2009). \"100 Biblical Arguments Against Sola Scriptura\" was published by Catholic Answers in May 2012. His \"Quotable Wesley\" compilation was published by (Protestant \/ Wesleyan publisher) Beacon Hill Press in April 2014. Several of his 49 books are bestsellers in their field. Dave maintains a popular personal Facebook page, a Facebook author page, and has a Twitter account as well. He offers almost all of his books in e-book form on his own Biblical Catholicism site (http:\/\/biblicalcatholicism.com\/), at a permanent deep discount: only $2.99 for ePub, mobi, and AZW, and $1.99 for PDF. His writing has been enthusiastically endorsed or recommended by many leading Catholic apologists, authors, and priests, including Dr. Scott Hahn, Fr. Peter M. J. Stravinskas, Marcus Grodi, Patrick Madrid, Steve Ray, Tim Staples, Devin Rose, Mike Aquilina, Al Kresta, Karl Keating, Fr. Dwight Longenecker, Brandon Vogt, Marcellino D'Ambrosio, and Fr. John A. Hardon, S. J. Dave has been happily married to his wife Judy since October 1984. 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