PASTOR DAVE’S MUSINGS FROM THE HEARTLAND

February 19, 2023

NOTHING NEW UNDER THE SUN

For a number of years I have been receiving catalogues for “The Great Courses.”  Recently, I broke down and bought two of them to see what they were like.  The first one was “The Great Tours: Ireland and Northern Ireland” by Marc C. Conner, PhD.  Several years ago Diane and I toured Ireland and Northern Ireland with my brother and his wife.  The second course was “American’s Founding Fathers” by Professor Allen C. Gueizo of Gettysburg College.

As I was listening to Professor Gueizo elucidate about our country’s founding and the world at that time, it seemed he could almost be talking about what is going on in our nation today.  Gueizo describes some of the founders as being dignified while “others were small and tending toward  hypochondria.”  Some were wise while others were a disaster waiting to happen.  Many of them had bitter a dislike of some of the other founders.  Each of them had their feet of clay, but each had their part to contribute to the founding our nation.

The governments of both the nation and states were dysfunctional, especially when it came to monetary policy.  Debt was a real problem.  There was serious division between the economic classes.  It seemed like in almost every lecture there was an incident of a mob reacting to something they did not like.  Several times groups of solders that had not been paid descended on the seat of government.  There was the Shays’s Rebellion and the battle of Fort Wilson.

In the Book of Ecclesiastes we read, “What has been is what will be, and what has been done is what will be done; there is nothing new under the sun.  Is there a thing of which it is said, ‘See, this is new?’  It has already been in the ages before us (Ecclesiastes 1:9-10).”  I would guess that there is very little happening in the public and political sphere for which there cannot be found at least one, if not more, examples from the past.

As I listened to each of Professor Gueizo’s lectures I was first reminded of things that I already knew.  However, I would say maybe as much as 50% of Professor Gueizo’s presentations I found new.  A case in point is Patrick Henry.  I had not known that he was influenced by the Great Awakening and his oratory skills were in large part a secular manifestation of the passionate preaching of persons such George Whitefield.  Several times Professor Gueizo makes mention of John Wesley and his influence on the American experiment.  I found Alexander Hamilton’s take on a republic form of government enlightening.

The late Winston Churchill is credited with saying “Those that fail to learn from history are doomed to repeat it.”  The Articles of Confederation were adopted by the Continental Congress on November 15, 1777, and remained in force in the newly created United States until 1789.  In his lectures Professor Guelzo describes how they proved to be an utter disaster.  He also describes the process, the issues, and the arguments that went into the making of our present Constitution.  Politicians and ordinary citizens would do well to heed Churchill’s advice.  A rereading of the genesis of the Constitution would go a long way to see how it is still relevant today and how its creation might give insight into the issues that we face today.

In all areas of our lives it is a good idea to have some idea of what has gone before.  Such a perspective can provide valuable insights to what is happening in the present.  There really is very little that is new.  Almost everything that happens has happened in some fashion in the past.  The question is, “Do we have the good sense to learn from the past so we might be more successful today and in the future?”