I have just started reading Eric Metaxas’s book called 7 Men and the Secrets of their Greatness. In his introduction, he starts by lamenting the fact that in our culture today, we have no role models to look up to, no heroes to emulate ourselves after, due to the fact that we tend to only focus on people’s faults, rather than their strengths and goodness, all in the name of questioning authority. Take, for example, George Washington. Traditionally, he has been affectionately known as the “Father of Our Country” who led our country to independence while denying the opportunity to be made king but is now instead being viewed as a wealthy landowner who hypocritically owned slaves. But is this really what questioning authority should really mean? Metaxas makes a very interesting point about this when he writes,
Since I was a kid in the seventies, we have had bumper stickers that said, ‘Question Authority.’ But this didn’t just mean we should question whether authority is legitimate, which would be a good idea. No, it seemed to me to go beyond that. It seemed to say that we should question the very idea of authority itself. So you could say that we’ve gone all the way from foolishly accepting all authority to foolishly rejecting all authority. We’ve gone from the extreme of being naive to the other extreme of being cynical. The golden mean, where we would question authority in order to determine whether it was legitimate, was passed by entirely.
Questioning Authority Doesn’t Mean Rejecting All Authority
Should questioning authority mean questioning the existence of authority itself? No, and I think to do so is a foolhardy notion. Those who say they reject all authority, in reality, are saying they reject all authority except their own. So really, they contradict themselves. With what authority do they reject other authority? With none? When people reject all authority, they become an authority unto themselves.
However, as Metaxas points out, questioning authority, when properly understood, means to question the legitimacy of a particular authority. We do this all the time when we critically analyze a speaker. What is their background in this subject? Do they have the proper expertise to speak authoritatively on this subject? Is their life consistent with their beliefs? Aristotle referred to this as a speaker’s ethos. Questioning authority in this way is a very important part of critical thinking. If a speaker is disingenuous in one part of their life, it leaves doubts as to whether they are trustworthy in presenting ideas on other subjects.
God is the Only Perfect Hero
In George Washington’s case, it is fair to point out his faults and failures, but not at the expense of his achievements. Our pursuit of perfection, when taken to an unhealthy extreme, can also lead the the rejection of all authority because all authority is imperfect (at least all human authority). This is why we also have to evaluate authority not only based on ethos, but on logic, and ultimately, for the Christian, on the authority of God, who is perfect. His authority is proved by His character, power, authorship, knowledge, and so on. From His objective authority we can judge those lesser authorities here on earth, including people like George Washington. We can critique his failings, but more importantly, we can celebrate his achievements and have practical examples of people to emulate ourselves after. They, despite their flaws, did great things. So we, despite our flaws, should go and do likewise.