Further DeLay

According to Byron York of National Review, the movie being made about DeLay prosecutor Ronnie Earle shows him saying "This is in the Bible. This isn't rocket science. The root of all evil truly is money, especially in politics." Actually, the Bible says (KJV): "For the love of money is the root of all evil." (Emphasis added to show the difference between Earle's statement and the God-breathed Scripture he tried to quote.) Nowhere in Scripture is there even a hint that money is evil, or the root of evil. The difference is not small. Suppose I said: "Lust for women causes almost all of the sin in men's lives." Without debating the value of my statement, suppose you quoted me as saying "women cause almost all of the sin in men's lives" - would that be an accurate quotation? Or, for my secular readers, if any, let's say a leading psychiatrist says: "Obsessing over one's work is unhealthy." To quote that psychiatrist the way Ronnie Earle quoted the Bible, you'd have to say: "Work is unhealthy."

So what? Well, the difference in the two understandings of the quoted verse makes a huge difference in what a person thinks and does. For one thing, people who understand the verse the way Earle does view people like Bill Gates and Sam Walton and Andrew Carnegie as among the most evil men of history. People who understand the verse the way I do are unwilling to consider evil someone whom we've never met. Also, if money is the root of all evil, giving it to the poor seems like something the Devil, not Christians, should be doing, since it would just be bringing evil into their lives. I don't know if Mr. Earle has taken his interpretation of this verse that far yet. Again, if money is the root of all evil, real Christians would throw it into the fireplace every chance they get - buying groceries with it would be out of the question, because that would make grocery stores and their employees more evil; Christians would be divided into two groups: the monastic Christians who grow their own food so they can circumvent the need for money, and evangelical Christians who try to earn as much money as they can to throw it into the fireplace - so as to spare everyone else its evil. This would be futile of course, as the government would just print more (and perhaps arrest those money-burning Christians), and the evil would be spread around nonetheless. Christians who understand this verse, on the other hand, know that money does have uses that are holy and righteous, and that there is nothing wrong with money in itself. The love of money (as Scripture says) is a root of all evils. If you love money (that is, if you are greedy), then you will have all kinds of problems. That is, if you always want more money, or are more afraid of losing your money than you are of letting go to waste by not helping anyone, then you love your money, and that will result in evil in your life. However, no matter how much money you have, as long as you see it as a tool to do good, and not as something to be desired on its own, you will always do what is right with your money, and it will result in no evil in your life. As Ronnie Earle said: "This is in the Bible. This isn't rocket science."

Basically, Ronnie Earle needs to learn Scripture better so he can apply it correctly, instead of misquoting it so that it seems to justify his actions. I hope he sincerely wants to do right, and he will be in my prayers for a while.

SRS