The terrorist will argue that the bomb is the most powerful weapon. Who can dispute the destructive power of a nuclear bomb? Others will declare the airplane or drone is the most powerful weapon because those deliver the bombs and without the means of delivery their explosive power would be dormant or ineffective.
Yet, others will say that the question of power overlooks the greater question of purpose. The target for which a weapon is used is the more important consideration than the power of the weapon itself. The assassin may prefer the thrust of a well-aimed stiletto, for the garrotter the seemingly innocuous cord is the weapon of choice, and for the timid or less-strong a few grams of cyanide in the victim’s cocoa will suffice. And we must not forget the megalomaniac or neighborhood bully’s invisible weapons of fear and intimidation.
A third group will submit that it is not a question of the powerfulness of a weapon or choosing the correct weapon to fit the target. Rather, the important thing is that a weapon is not inherently evil in itself but can be used for both good or ill. The laser used to destroy enemies can destroy the cataract to improve sight. The poison of chemo-therapy kills the cancerous portions of the body in order to sustain the larger organism. The bullet that kills the dictator bent on genocide may save thousands of lives.
Weapons evolve over time. The first weapons were blunt instruments (fists, stones, or clubs) and still favored in some detective stories. The up-close-and-personal blunt instrument was replaced by the more impersonal projectile (the arrow, the bullet, and the bomb). Through man’s ingenuity and industriousness, each generation of weapons provides new ways to oppress, maim, and kill. In time all weapons deteriorate and become ineffective. Even the bully’s power fades, and he is replaced by a younger, stronger thug. Although weapons corrode or become obsolete and tyrants die, there is one thing that never loses its power and never grows old. It is the word.
The supreme importance of two things is shown by their existence in God’s realm before He created the universe and all therein including man: the word and love. How is this possible? It is possible because God was the word and God is love. We know this from John’s gospel. “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He (Jesus) was in the beginning with God…” [John 1:1. RSV] We are told in 1 John 4:8 that, “…God is love.” In the Revelation to John we also see that God’s love for His special creation existed before creation itself, “And all mankind—whose names were not written down before the founding of the world in the slain Lamb’s book of life—worshipped the evil creature.” [Revelation 13:8, Living Bible] [emphasis added] God loved man before his creation. God did not need man’s love, but rather it was a will to love, an expression of the very character of God, to share the inner life of the Trinity.
Language is unique to mankind. To compare the screeches, grunting, and howls of various species to that of human language is to compare mere recognition of night from day to that of a watch of intricate precision which can measure time to an accuracy of a fraction of a second. Richard Weaver wrote of the power of the word.
[There is an]…ancient belief that a divine element is present in language. The feeling that to have power of language is to have control over things is deeply imbedded in the human mind. We see it in the way men gifted in speech are feared or admired; we see it in the potency ascribed to incantations, interdictions, and curses. We see it in the legal force given to oath or word.[1]
The author of the New Testament book of James called the tongue a small member of the body but which boasts great power. He compares it to a small fire that can set ablaze a great forest. James also speaks of the difficulty of taming the tongue and the great harm it can cause. “For every kind of beast and bird, of reptile and sea creature, can be tamed and has been tamed by humankind, but no human being can tame the tongue—a restless evil, full of deadly poison.” [James 3:5, 7-8. RSV]
In the first chapter of Genesis we see that God spoke into existence the universe, the earth, and all therein, and a divine order was stamped on creation. Man was God’s special creation and given dominion over the earth and the power of the word to name every creature. But man rebelled against God’s order and was separated from a right relation with Him. Disorder now ruled man’s life.
As Weaver has said, speech is a divine element for humans were made in the image of God. But man is a fallen creature, and the poet Ralph Waldo Emerson sums up the consequences, “The corruption of man is followed by the corruption of language.”[2] In His revelation, God instructed man on how he ought to live life and included the right use of the word. Such was the importance of the word to God, His instruction to man as to the proper use of the word required two of the Ten Commandments, “You shall not take the name of the Lord your God in vain; for the Lord will not hold him guiltless who takes his name in vain…You shall not bear false witness against your neighbor.” [Exodus 20: 7, 16. RSV]
For all of man’s time on earth language has been the means of achieving order in culture. But in this modern age humanists have effectively used semantics to neuter words of their meaning in historical and symbolic contexts, that is, words now mean what men want them to mean.[3]
We live in a world of increasing disorder sustained and propelled by the perversion of language in which the meaning of words and ideas are separated from truth. Weaver recognized the folly of such perversion, “…here begins that relativism which by now is visibly affecting those institutions which depend for their very existence upon our ability to use language as a permanent binder.”[4] Words freed from the anchor of truth (reality) disorient and provide no clarity or direction regarding fixed, eternal values necessary for order that mankind craves and requires for living life.
The ordering and sustaining power of truthful words reverberates through history. Whether our words are a weapon of evil or an instrument of good is a matter of choice, and three thousand years ago Solomon identified the importance of that choice when he said there is power of life and death in the tongue. We must choose life, and life is found in biblical truths revealed to the ancient Hebrews and first century Christians.
Larry G. Johnson
Sources:
[1] Richard M. Weaver, Ideas Have Consequences, (Chicago, Illinois: The University of Chicago Press, 1948), p. 148.
[2] Ibid.
[3] Ibid., pp. 148, 151.
[4] George M. Curtis, III and James J. Thompson, Jr., eds., The Southern Essays of Richard M. Weaver, (Indianapolis, Indiana: Liberty Fund, 1997), p. 196-197.
