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Authors: Frederic C. Rich
Tags: General Fiction
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anglicisms from the bankers with whom she worked but also a casual vulgarity that had not been part of her vocabulary when we met.
“What’s that?”
“Look. Pakistan. A stoning. Of a couple. She’s only seventeen. She ran off with this boy, and they were both convicted of sex outside of marriage and sentenced by this mullah judge person to death by stoning. Stoning? It’s completely medieval. What are these people thinking?”
This was not an isolated incident. After 9/11 and the fascination with the Islamic world which it engendered, Western media coverage of Islamic punishments exploded. Sentences of lashing, whipping, stoning, flogging, amputation, and the like were reported with shock and outrage. Humanitarians, lawyers, and assorted do-gooders were dispatched to Arab capitals to plead for suspended or commuted sentences. What was largely unnoticed at the time was that American evangelical leaders were not among those condemning these barbaric practices. And what went largely unreported at the time was the newly public enthusiasm of the Christian reconstructionists for the literal application of Old Testament penalties.
I found a clipping in Adam’s file from 1998, my sophomore year in high school. It reported a speech made by Gary North, Rushdoony’s son-in-law, to an evangelical audience. He did not even bother to make the general case for capital punishment for adultery, homosexuality, and blasphemy (among other crimes), as he would have correctly assumed that his audience already accepted this as a biblical imperative. Instead he addressed the method of execution and explained the great wisdom of the Bible in specifying stoning as the required method for these particularly heinous crimes:
Why stoning? There are many reasons. First, the implements of execution are available to everyone at virtually no cost … Executions are community projects—not with spectators who watch a professional executioner do “his” duty, but rather with actual participants. That modern Christians never consider the possibility of the reintroduction of stoning for capital crimes indicates how thoroughly humanistic concepts of punishment have influenced the thinking of Christians.
As usual, North was being utterly transparent. Those who focused simply on the perceived barbarity of stoning entirely missed the point. He was correct that the essence of stoning as a punishment is indeed community participation. In the accounts of stoning in Afghanistan, Pakistan, North Africa, and Indonesia, the detail most often overlooked is the determination of the religious authorities to force entire villages to participate. And why? Because afterward the entire village is complicit and completely invested in the continuance of religious rule for the absolution of its guilt. Only religious law can justify the stone thrower’s act. Without religious law, the villager has been reduced to a brutal thug who killed his neighbor in a particularly heinous manner.
I could tell that Sanjay was hesitating to engage with Emilie on this topic.
“Did you know,” he said, “that there are many people here who believe that all Old Testament punishments, including stoning, should be restored?”
“No way,” said Emilie. “Impossible. Maybe some nutcases in Oklahoma.”
“Well, since you mention Oklahoma, did you know that most statewide executive offices in Oklahoma are now held by an evangelical? Together with 85 percent of the state legislature. Most of them support the entire agenda—criminalization of homosexuality, adultery and blasphemy, the death penalty for abortionists, reinstatement of school prayer, a requirement that creationism be taught in public schools—and all based on the Bible as ultimate law. They call their vision of America a Christian Nation—and all that stands in the way of that vision is the federal court system.”
“Well, if that’s true, and I doubt it is, then it really doesn’t matter. Who’s ever been to
“What’s that?”
“Look. Pakistan. A stoning. Of a couple. She’s only seventeen. She ran off with this boy, and they were both convicted of sex outside of marriage and sentenced by this mullah judge person to death by stoning. Stoning? It’s completely medieval. What are these people thinking?”
This was not an isolated incident. After 9/11 and the fascination with the Islamic world which it engendered, Western media coverage of Islamic punishments exploded. Sentences of lashing, whipping, stoning, flogging, amputation, and the like were reported with shock and outrage. Humanitarians, lawyers, and assorted do-gooders were dispatched to Arab capitals to plead for suspended or commuted sentences. What was largely unnoticed at the time was that American evangelical leaders were not among those condemning these barbaric practices. And what went largely unreported at the time was the newly public enthusiasm of the Christian reconstructionists for the literal application of Old Testament penalties.
I found a clipping in Adam’s file from 1998, my sophomore year in high school. It reported a speech made by Gary North, Rushdoony’s son-in-law, to an evangelical audience. He did not even bother to make the general case for capital punishment for adultery, homosexuality, and blasphemy (among other crimes), as he would have correctly assumed that his audience already accepted this as a biblical imperative. Instead he addressed the method of execution and explained the great wisdom of the Bible in specifying stoning as the required method for these particularly heinous crimes:
Why stoning? There are many reasons. First, the implements of execution are available to everyone at virtually no cost … Executions are community projects—not with spectators who watch a professional executioner do “his” duty, but rather with actual participants. That modern Christians never consider the possibility of the reintroduction of stoning for capital crimes indicates how thoroughly humanistic concepts of punishment have influenced the thinking of Christians.
As usual, North was being utterly transparent. Those who focused simply on the perceived barbarity of stoning entirely missed the point. He was correct that the essence of stoning as a punishment is indeed community participation. In the accounts of stoning in Afghanistan, Pakistan, North Africa, and Indonesia, the detail most often overlooked is the determination of the religious authorities to force entire villages to participate. And why? Because afterward the entire village is complicit and completely invested in the continuance of religious rule for the absolution of its guilt. Only religious law can justify the stone thrower’s act. Without religious law, the villager has been reduced to a brutal thug who killed his neighbor in a particularly heinous manner.
I could tell that Sanjay was hesitating to engage with Emilie on this topic.
“Did you know,” he said, “that there are many people here who believe that all Old Testament punishments, including stoning, should be restored?”
“No way,” said Emilie. “Impossible. Maybe some nutcases in Oklahoma.”
“Well, since you mention Oklahoma, did you know that most statewide executive offices in Oklahoma are now held by an evangelical? Together with 85 percent of the state legislature. Most of them support the entire agenda—criminalization of homosexuality, adultery and blasphemy, the death penalty for abortionists, reinstatement of school prayer, a requirement that creationism be taught in public schools—and all based on the Bible as ultimate law. They call their vision of America a Christian Nation—and all that stands in the way of that vision is the federal court system.”
“Well, if that’s true, and I doubt it is, then it really doesn’t matter. Who’s ever been to
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