James Dobson has made a very public criticism of Barack Obama’s speech on faith and politics. His criticism of a Democratic candidate for president is not surprising. These days he is highly critical of both Democratic and Republican candidates. The logic of his criticism however is quite faulty and extremely naive.
In his reponse to Obama’s claim that James Dobson was to the right what Al Sharpton was to the left, Dobson ridiculed that criticism by claiming that Obama was esentially comparing apples to oranges. He claimed that he was not a religious leader, he was not a pastor or a theologian. He state explicitly that he is a psychologist and his PhD from USC is in childhood development. So for Obama to compare Dobson to a religious leader was absurd. First of all, it doesn’t matter what you claim to be, it is your public role that matters. And whether he’ll admit it or not, Dobson is a religious leader for the right.
Yet, the hypocritical point came soon after Dobson rejected playing any role as a theologian or Biblical scholar. When Obama spoke of the Bible Dobson very quickly claimed that Obama was distorting the Bible and he had a wrong interpretation of the Bible. Hence, no one can criticize Dobson for his religious pontifications because that’s not his official role. Yet he is qualify enough to tell the world that some one else’s view on religion is wrong.
In question was Obama’s raising of the Levitical laws for modern living. Dobson claimed that it was wrong to bring up Old Testament food restrictions, teachings on slavery, and punishment as laws that should be obeyed today. He claimed that in light of New Testament laws all those things were irrelevant. I personally believe that the Old Testament HAS TO be read in light of the New Testament, and vice versa. Otherwise neither testemant makes sense. We do have only one bible… But Dobson forgets that in light of New Testament teachings, teachings from Jesus himself! He and all Christians should stay out of politics because there is no New Testament grounds for Christians to be involved in politics, helping or preventing people from taking political office. I can’t see any Biblical teaching that leads to that.
Dobson claims that Obama is “deliberately distorting the traditional understanding of the Bible to fit his own worldview, his own confused theology.” Sure, he might be but he’s certainly not the first. Seems to be a case of Matthew 7:5
