Tolerence - Jung Min Kim

T o l e r a n c e

What is Tolerance ?

According to the Cambridge English Dictionary, tolerance is “willingness to accept behaviour and beliefs that are different from your own, although you might not agree with or approve of them.”

Tolerance is about accepting and understanding differences between people.

Michael W. Austin describe tolerance as “The capacity to disagree strongly with another person about issues, including significant ones, while maintaining civility and respecting their right to hold a different view than you, even if you are convinced it is false.”

Ancient and Modern understanding of Religious Tolerance

Ancient	Modern
Guided by a divinely sanctioned, politically justified, and legally grounded rationality. Have much to do with reason, state, and public policy.	Driven by a state-mandated, individually sanctioned volition coupled to a juridically limited notion of rationality Have much to do with will and little to do with reason, state, and public policy

Tolerance is a religious and civic virtue that maintains a divinely sanctioned cosmopolitan state ruled by a divine king or Senate and Caesars. This suggests that tolerance was not designed to help maintain individual rights or to increase the welfare of a group. Indeed, tolerance does not involve high risk or sacrifice to agent or group.Tolerance is grounded in a reasoned political reciprocity and social justice that had as its rationale the maintenance of the state. - Religious Tolerance in World Religions (p. 84)

The Three D’s of Tolerance

Tolerance Requires a Disagreement

Tolerance is unnecessary when you and I agree on something. What’s there to tolerate when we both agree? Tolerance is required when two people don’t agree on something important. Tolerance is a strategy for peaceful coexistence in the midst of disagreement. Tolerance is the attitude we adopt when we refuse to embrace a notion as true, not the act of embracing that notion as though it were true.

Tolerance Requires a Distinction

Tolerance is required when the two positions we hold are distinctly opposed. Competing worldviews that contradict one another, for example, require us to adopt an attitude of tolerance. The more self examined you are in your approach to truth, the more necessary it is to learn to tolerate others. The more you examine truth, the more likely you are to find that others will disagree with you.

Tolerance Requires a Demeanor

Finally, tolerance requires a response in the midst of the distinction and disagreement. The proper reaction is not acquiescence to the proposal or worldview being offered, but is instead a loving demeanor toward those with whom we disagree. It’s OK to hate a bad idea, as long as we remember that we are called to love those who hold bad ideas. How I react toward other people is what defines me as tolerant, not how I react toward ideas.

How to be a (Truly) Tolerant Christian

Originally, tolerance meant to acknowledge that others have different beliefs and accept that it is their right to do. Recently, tolerance has come to mean accepting that those other beliefs are true.

No Discrimination Allowed

The equality of men rests essentially on their dignity as persons and the rights that flow from it:

Every form of social or cultural discrimination in fundamental personal rights on the grounds of sex, race, color, social conditions, language, or religion must be curbed and eradicated as incompatible with God's design.40 (Catechism of the Catholic Church, 1935)

Reject the Sin, Not the Person

To prove their point, such “tolerant” Christians often cite the following Gospel story in which Jesus prevents the stoning of an adulteress:

The scribes and the Pharisees brought a woman who had been caught in adultery, and placing her in the midst they said to him, “Teacher, this woman has been caught in the act of adultery. Now in the law Moses commanded us to stone such. What do you say about her?” This they said to test him, that they might have some charge to bring against him. Jesus bent down and wrote with his finger on the ground. And as they continued to ask him, he stood up and said to them, “Let him who is without sin among you be the first to throw a stone at her.” And once more he bent down and wrote with his finger on the ground. But when they heard it, they went away, one by one, beginning with the eldest, and Jesus was left alone with the woman standing before him. Jesus looked up and said to her, “Woman, where are they? Has no one condemned you?’ She said, ‘No one, Lord.” And Jesus said, “Neither do I condemn you; go, and do not sin again.” (John 8:3-11)

Jesus admonished the adulteress, “do not sin again.” Jesus does not condemn the sinner because there is still hope for her salvation, but he does reject the sinful behavior which could put her salvation in jeopardy.

How Should We Act?

According to Scripture, Christian tolerance of undesirable behavior seems to extend only to the point of putting up with it, enduring it, or bearing it for a greater good. It never crosses the line into condoning immorality.

For example, when dealing with obstinate disbelief Jesus said, “You faithless generation, how much longer must I be among you? How much longer must I put up with you?” (Mark 9:19).

Paul wrote to the Ephesians, “I therefore, the prisoner in the Lord, beg you to lead a life worthy of the calling to which you have been called, with all humility and gentleness, with patience, bearing with one another in love, making every effort to maintain the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace” (Eph. 4:1-3). It seems that Paul encouraged Christians to bear with one another for the sake of peaceful unity.
Paul concurs: “Now we command you, beloved, in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, to keep away from believers who are living in idleness and not according to the tradition that they received from us” (2 Thess. 3:6).

Reconciliation Is the Goal

Ultimately, rejecting a person’s sinful behavior without condemning him can help to lead that person to repentance and salvation. Paul indicates this in God’s own example: “[D]o you despise the riches of his kindness and forbearance and patience? Do you not realize that God’s kindness is meant to lead you to repentance?” (Rom. 2:4). That’s the goal: a loved one’s reconciliation with God which will get him back on the path to salvation.

Verses from the Bible

“[Love] does not behave indecently.” (1 Corinthians 13:5) Although Jesus was a model of tolerance, he did not condone indecency, hypocrisy, and other forms of badness. Instead, he boldly condemned such things. (Matthew 23:13) “Whoever practices vile things hates the light [of truth],” he said.—John 3:20.

The Christian apostle Paul wrote: “Abhor what is wicked; cling to what is good.” (Romans 12:9) He lived by those words. For example, when certain Jewish Christians segregated themselves from non-Jewish believers, Paul—who was himself a Jew—firmly but kindly spoke up. (Galatians 2:11-14) He knew that God, who “is not partial,” would not tolerate racial prejudice among His people.—Acts 10:34.

As Christians, Jehovah’s Witnesses look to the Bible for moral guidance. (Isaiah 33:22) Hence, they do not tolerate wickedness in their ranks. The clean Christian congregation must not be corrupted by people who brush aside God’s standards. To that end, the Witnesses obey the clear Biblical directive: “Remove the wicked person from among yourselves.”—1 Corinthians 5:11-13.

“For you, being so wise, tolerate the foolish gladly. For you tolerate it if anyone enslaves you, anyone devours you, anyone takes advantage of you, anyone exalts himself, anyone hits you in the face.” – 2 Corinthians 11:19–20

Summary