The tyranny of the weaker brother

I've been meaning to blog this for a few days now and it's been sitting in a tab in Firefox waiting for me to get a really good response. It arises from a comment left on a posting I made a little while back following a report about a Christian Yoga where I pointed out the problems with the way that evangelicals typically deal with complementary therapies and things like yoga which have 'Eastern religious' associations. I'll quote form the site referenced in the comment. It was good of the person implicitly critiqued in my posting to reply relatively gracious [save for a spot of sarcasm -perhaps understandably].

"In light of the facts – the religious philosophy and history of yoga "
Yet if you look into this claim, it does not really carry much weight. The articles that Ms Willis seems to prefer on the apologetic front, don't actually demonstrate the case they purport to make. They assert without proof; actually an example of damning by association that I mention in the post that set this all off. The refutation of this implied genetic fallacy is also back in that original post

But here's the thing that has been bugging me, and you may note that it is pretty much what Laurette Willis says in her comment on my post:
"– take a look at Paul’s warning to believers in the Corinthian church about meat offered to idols, “All things are lawful for me, but not all things are helpful; all things are lawful for me, but not all things edify. Let no one seek his own, but each one the other’s well-being… If anyone says to you, ‘This was offered to idols,’ do not eat it for the sake of the one who told you, and for conscience’ sake…not your own, but that of the other… not seeking my own profit, but the profit of many, that they may be saved” (1 Corinthians 10:23-24; 28-29, 33). To strong Christians (strong in their relationship with the Lord as well as the strong-willed, strong-minded ones) I say - certainly, you may not be adversely affected by the subtle seeds of doubt and New Age thought planted in yoga classes. ... However, would you agree there are people in your life you influence? Do you think there may be some unbelievers and new believers watching you?"

I recall a former teacher of mine talking about the tyranny of the weaker brother and I think that this is a relevant thing to consider here. The problem with the weaker brother argument is that it proves too much, at least if used as it is here. By extension the argument can be used to, for example, stop Christians drinking alcohol even in moderation [on the basis that the weaker alcoholic brother my be led into sin thereby. It could be used to deny some Christians the use of the internal combustion engine on the basis of the temptation it places before our Mennonite bretheren or the eating of meat because of the temptation it implicitly offers to weaker brothers who believe the more godly way is vegetarian on the basis of meat eating only being allowed in a concessionary manner after the flood ... I guess I could go on but you get the picture I hope. Basically, if we are not careful the weaker brother argument ends up halting developments in church life because we would always have to defer to those who 'in conscience' cannot accept a proposed change, and who's to say that they don't then fall to the temptation to use that 'policy' to get their own way? Thus we end up letting them fall into sin anyway by deferring to the weaker brother argument ... !?

So let's just think a bit carefully about this in a wider frame. Paul himself while being quite prepared to let a matter like not eating meat offered to idols go in certain circumstances where it was not a matter of urgency, was nevertheless prepared to challenge weaker brother stances in cases like circumcision [see Galatians] which were mission critical. Or in relation to alcohol; Jesus drank the stuff, he must have known about alcoholism [maybe not in today's terms but ...], yet he still drank wine, shall we accuse Jesus of not being sensitive to the weaker brother? He wasn't so sensitive to the tender consciences of those Pharisees who were in conscience tied to the halachic observance of the Torah; in fact he challenged their interpretation and challenged them. God Himself directly challenged Peter's tender conscience on the matter of eating unclean meat [Acts 10.9ff]. No allowances for the weaker brother's conscience here. Why? I suspect because these were matters that were vital for the forwarding of the mission of God and those with tender consciences needed to be challenged at that point to get with the plot rather than holding it up.

It also looks to me as if Paul wasn't generalising the idea: he seems to have th eattitude that he will act in accordance with what he beleives is correct, but only if faced directly by a weaker brother who may be tripped up by his [Paul's] actions] will the principle of not unnecessarily causing offence kick in. We can't live our Christian lives looking overour shoulders at what others may or may not think. Paul isn't exemplifying this or commending it. But is saying that if in a direct personal encounter we find a weaker brother [or sister, of course] is being deflected from their path we should defer for their good. How does this work out? Well I enjoy a glass of wine of an evening and maybe a couple on the odd occasion when I go out. But if I was with an alcoholic on the wagon, then I should be prepared to give that wine up in order to help them stay sober. However, that's not to say that I become teetotal myself, just on those occasions when it might be a problem to someone else. So I might go to yoga classes for a number of reasons [currently I don't btw] but if I did find that there was a particular person who found that too difficult I would be prepared not to go on an occasion. Paul wasn't talking about giving up eating meat offered to idols full stop. Rather on particular occasions.

And that is my purpose in holding that we should be less worried about this yoga thing than John Ankerburg and Laurette Willis would have us be. Laurette asked: "Are yoga classes the only place to engage with culture?" And one answer is that of course they are not. However, for me, if I want to meet the kinds of spiritual seekers who I think that our church programmes are missing precisely because they are church-based, then a good place to start is a yoga class. This is a circumcision type issue. I suspect that Paul would have happily said that the importance of reaching out to non-believers would have meant that he would have eaten meat offered to idols even in Corinth if it meant a chance to explain the good news to those who had not heard. In fact if you read round the texts mentioned above, I think you'll find that this is implied fairly directly byt the way Paul frames his hypothetical situation. Paul's concern is unnecessary offence, sometimes however, we can't be that responsible for others, especially hypothetically and outside of genuine relationship with them. And especially when to do so is to confirm people in errors that in the longer term are even worse for their spiritual health or the mission of the church. Christian superstitiousness about 'occult infection' really must be challenged. As must the unproven genetic fallacy ideas which seem to owe more to meaning holism than the gospel.

Why a Christian ALTERNATIVE to Yoga?: