Reading: Exodus 20:16, Pentecost Sunday, June 11, 2000
By the Rev. Karen F. Siegfriedt,
St. Jude the Apostle Episcopal Church, Cupertino CA
A friend of mine recently told me a story about her early experience as a newly graduated lawyer. She landed her first job in a plush, Palo Alto law firm, where she did research for various "partners" at the firm. One day, soon after she was hired, a partner asked her to do some research. Wearing a polo outfit and carrying a crop, he said to her, "I want you to find a way that will allow my client to pull off this task." She diligently went to the books and researched the area of concern. Later, she was called into his office to discuss what she had found. She said that she had researched the topic thoroughly but that there was no legal way for his client to proceed. He cut her off curtly and said, "That is not what I asked you to do. I asked you to find a way for my client to succeed." Again she reiterated that there was no way that his client could do what he had hoped to do. A few days later, she was called into the office of the other partner who had hired her. He had been told at a meeting that day, that she had been insubordinate. It was her word against the powerful partner's word.
A viable human community depends on truth telling. In order for a society to move forward, there is a basic need to be able to trust one another's word. Today I would like to continue my sermon series on the Ten Commandments and focus my attention on the ninth: Thou Shalt Not Bear False Witness. Bearing false witness is one of the ways persons in the community are assaulted, diminished, and destroyed, especially the least powerful or the most vulnerable.
Whenever we speak about the Ten Commandments, we need to remember that these commandments were not separate moral commands to be kept by individuals. The commandments were laws that guided the people of Israel to live in harmony with each other so that their civilization could survive. For the people of Israel, truth telling was vital. If someone was falsely accused, death could be the punishment. So the people of Israel set up a means of punishing anyone bearing false witness. According to the book of Deuteronomy, a single witness was not sufficient enough to convict a person of any crime or wrongdoing. "Only the evidence of two or three witnesses shall sustain a charge. If a malicious witness comes forward to accuse someone of wrongdoing, then the judges shall make a thorough inquiry." If that witness was found to be lying, then the false witness received the punishment or the judgement that the accused would have received. (Deut. 19:15) It was a forceful way of discouraging deceit.
When I was in the sixth grade, another student and I were accused by my sewing teacher as having said a swear word. I was innocent. Mary Melnick was the one who had sworn. The teacher took us both down to the principal's office to be disciplined. When I told the principal that I was innocent, he called me a liar and threatened to expel me. It was a Friday afternoon. I was about to go on vacation for a week during which time, I was to take a test to get into the only decent school in the City of Boston. When I told my mother my side of the story, she did not believe me but instead believed the teacher. After all, a teacher wouldn't lie. I was very distressed for days. I was grounded for that week, except to take the entrance exam. This I did with great anxiety. When the test results came back, I was told that I had failed the entrance exam by four points. Now whether I would have passed that test had I been more centered, I will never know. Failing that exam resulted in six more years of a substandard education. As you can tell, I have never forgotten this incident of having been the victim of false witness.
I have been a victim of someone bearing false witness against me, three times in my life (two of which were done by so called dedicated Christians.) These experiences engendered in me, impotent rage. Impotent rage can cause great distress in a person's life. Not being able to rely on other people telling the truth can erode one's ability to trust others. And if we walk around with a tendency to distrust others, there is no sense of a viable community.
The prohibition against false witness is something we need to revisit and take more seriously in our society today. There is a tendency in politics and business to collapse the truth into propaganda in the service of ideology. Public versions of truth are not committed to a portrayal of reality, but to a rendering that serves a partisan interest. Such a practice may take many forms. Our political parties make promises that they do not intend to keep. In the current litigious atmosphere, many folks gladly use the legal system as an opportunity to satisfy their greed rather than to promote justice. There are so many loopholes in our legal system that justice is not always served. Some lawyers have become famous for their abilities to take sharp advantage of the law rather than cultivate a passion for truth telling. We speak of doublespeak, words that make lies sound like the truth, and credibility gaps. Perjury has become all too familiar. How can we make decisions, how can we vote, how can maintain honorable relationships with each other unless we speak the truth?
Gossip is another form of bearing false witness in a community because most gossip is either unsubstantiated or only reflects a partial truth. If you have ever been the victim of gossip, you know the destruction that can come about by the misuse of words.
Today is Pentecost Sunday. It is the day of the year which the Church sets aside to recognize that historical movement when the Spirit of God came upon the early disciples in such a powerful way, that they moved from a place of fear to a place of confidence. Having been empowered by the Holy Spirit, the disciples who had formally feared for their lives after having witnessed the crucifixion, came out of hiding and began to proclaim the gospel. The book of Acts tells us that "when the day of Pentecost had come, the disciples were all together in one place. And suddenly a sound came from heaven like the rush of a mighty wind, and it filled all the house were they were sitting. And there appeared to them tongues of fire, distributed and resting on each one of them. And they were filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak in other tongues, as the Spirit gave them utterance." (Acts 2:1-11)
There are some folks who have received this gift of speaking in tongues. It is a holy language that is spirit filled. Our Korean brothers and sisters who worship in our sanctuary often speak in tongues. But whether we have the gift of tongues or whether we have other gifts, all of us have been given the gift of the presence of the Holy Spirit. As you remember the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, gentleness, faithfulness, and self-control. The Holy Spirit is the spirit of God within us, leading us into all truth and enabling us to grow in the likeness of Christ. If our bodies are to be the temple of the Holy Spirit, then our tongues are to be used to bless each other, not to curse each other. It is said that it takes 15 compliments to neutralize one harsh word.
If we could see others as God sees us, we would but genuflect before each another. How different life could be if we used our tongues only to bless; to help each other grow into the likeness of Christ. Our current society is made up of people who take the matter of telling the truth lightly. We are worse off for it. Our duty to our neighbors is to love them as ourselves and to do to other people as we wish them to do to us. Therefore, let us speak the truth, and not to mislead others by our silence or by our hedging on the truth.