"Dabney On Fire" with Zachary Garris

All right, welcome to the conversations that matter podcast My name is John Harris and I got another interview this week.

I have Zack Garris with me and not Harris Garris so the

G not an H but you know Zack, you're a brave man because you know,

I have a I guess a career as a student right now in history and I've studied a lot of Antebellum sources and of course because of that I've had to be a little bit familiar with The works of Robert Louis Dabney, but in today's day and age

He's not a very popular guy and you just came out with a book called Dabney on fire, which

I think would probably be the situation a lot of people today would love to see Dabney and on fire

But you of course meant that in a positive way. So why don't you tell me about why you decided to publish this book and What you have gleaned from RL Dabney and just tell me a little about you know yourself and what you're up to as well

Sure. Well a little bit about myself. I'm Seminary graduate went to Reform Theological Seminary in Jackson, Mississippi, and I actually just finished law school.

So Kind of dabbling in two different fields as far as Dabney You know 19th century

Presbyterian pastor theologian extremely influential And used to be considered a hero of the church certainly in Presbyterianism and He's really been dismissed

You know today he's essentially ignored by most even within Presbyterian circles in my experience

Yet he was as I said extremely important. He was a leader in the Southern Presbyterian Church particularly after the

War between the states and he was the first biographer of Stonewall Jackson So he's you know provided important resources there for later biographers

And yet he's ignored today because of his association with the Confederacy and He owned slaves and defended the practice

As far as the book, why did I publish Dabney on fire? Well, if you read

Dabney's works, he's Extremely helpful very insightful and a lot of his essays

Applied to today, you know when he speaks on some of the things I include in this book on government

Feminism, I mean he's dealing with the early stages of feminism, but his criticisms applied to today and he was able to Foresee a lot of the things that would happen in the future.

I think that's what makes Dabney so fascinating to read is he's he's dealing with the early stages of progressivism in the

United States and He's predicting exactly where it's gonna go. And so he does this with public education with feminism and some other government policies

And so that's why I published this book is just to make it more accessible you know, you can

Purchase his works on your own his Discussions is a collection of his essays is available, but it'll cost you, you know over $100 for the five -volume set a lot of his works are available online, but they're usually scanned

PDFs and Most people don't like to read those on your computer if you're like me

So what I did is I took four of his essays I put an introductory essay at the beginning and then

I added footnotes an introductory Section to each essay of Dabney's and then

I also added some more subheadings and Just made it easier to read.

So really the goal this book is just making Dabney more accessible to Readers today.

Yeah, it was accessible. I really appreciated your Headlines there so when

I was reading through it I could figure out okay, this is what he's talking about if I kind of lost track and You know, you have four essays here.

One is on parental responsibilities. One is on secularized education The third one's on women's rights and then the fourth and last one is on civic ethics

And you know, you can tell Dabney has a wide breadth of knowledge and these he's a deep thinker

And that probably is what inspired folks like Warfield and other southern Presbyterians especially to look to him as this kind of Monumental figure and I know he's written.

I believe a systematic theology and other things as well. You're just kind of compiling more his social Commentary right, is that correct?

That's correct. And if people want more of his theology, I would encourage him to just go purchase his systematic theology

It is still available from Banner truth, and it's it's very helpful. It was his

Lecture notes from his teaching and he he published it. This was actually the second edition

But yeah, that was highly praised. It was used in the seminaries in the southern Presbyterian seminaries

Yeah, and so very influential work, you know I first got into Dabney a little bit because like I said before my own interest and my own study in antebellum history especially

Ecclesiastical history and so of course that you know I'm pretty familiar with the defense of Virginia in the south, which is what he wrote after the war and you know

If you're a Christian, especially but it just if you're a historian if you want to understand more of a southern perspective

I think you really need to read that book and there's a lot of Historians at Christian institutions who don't even know that the book exists

Which to me is is a little bit even if you don't agree with it You have to contend with the arguments that he's making.

I think to be educated on the topic. So that's how I kind of got familiar with him, but then you know,

I As I was reading other sources and you know postbellum history, especially

I saw that Dabney would say things In different essays that were just prophetic and you include one of these essays

I'm gonna go out a little bit out of order I guess here but Your second chapter on secularized education

Dabney says something that just is prophetic He says this is an 1879. Just think about this 1879

He says the state will fall into the hands of teachers who will not even teach secular learning

Honestly money will be wasted and the schools will become corrupting examples to their own pupils of slighted work and abused trusts

Christians must prepare themselves then for the following results all Prayers catechisms and Bibles will ultimately be driven out of the schools

Infidelity and practical ungodliness will become increasingly prevalent among Protestant youth and our churches will have a more arduous contest for growth if not for existence

That sounds like what we're living today, which is incredible to me that he could have seen this in 1879 and And you know, he has insights like this on other things

I mean, I think his his essay on feminism which you include is the same exact way, but what gave Dabney this prophetic?

Kind of eye to see what was happening downstream from his time Yeah, that's a good question

You read that quote that is fascinating, you know here he's writing almost a hundred years before Supreme Court Rulings driving prayer and Bible reading out of the public schools and he's he's saying this is exactly what's going to happen

How is he able to do it I think part of it is he was extremely well educated had

You know as you mentioned just a vast array of knowledge, but he was also

Very intelligent. He was very logical and so he's able to See what's going on at the time, you know this newly introduced

Statewide public school system in Virginia, which was new in Virginia and in the south after the the war and He's just following the logic, you know as to what's going to happen.

I mean he makes the argument that It will not be a Christian system because it will have to cater to the lowest common denominator, which he says is atheism secularism and He's yeah, he's able to understand exactly what's what's going to take place so I I can't fully explain how he's so prophetic but That's just my my thoughts on is is his

Intelligence it seemed to me Reading a bunch of these essays that Dabney like you said, he's a logical thinker

But he obviously and I don't know if you're presuppositional or not in your apologetic methodology but he

I almost caught hints of what reminded me of Van Til a little bit even though he preceded Van Til and but he would have this ability to kind of look at a philosophy or worldview and Get to the bottom of it.

Okay, let's get to the skeleton Let's get to the structure of what we're looking at and he would just pick apart the assumption the root assumptions of things and be able to extrapolate forward what would happen if these root assumptions were left unchecked and He said things

I'm sure in his day that must have made people think that he was slightly nutty at least in certain circles

You know, you're kidding me Bibles are gonna be taken out of schools, you know women are gonna be abused I mean, he's looking at feminism.

It's like women are gonna be abused. They're gonna be you know subject to the brutality of men because they've given up their place as their uniqueness as a woman and and so people would have probably said you're crazy and look at him now and He looks like, you know exactly what was going on and you know

Maybe we should go back and and check out what he had to say because maybe he has something to say to us today That was my sense at least while reading it the first essay though that you

Include in this is on parental responsibilities. What can you tell me about? Dabney's view on parenting

Well, this is Dabney's least controversial essay that I included in the book And I wanted to start off with this one because I think it's an inspiring essay for Christians for parents aspiring parents and Dabney this was a sermon that he gave to the

Presbyterian, Virginia and He really just Walks through the significance of parents and the task of parenting and I think some people kind of downplay the influence parents can have on their children and Dabney Really gets into the details, you know as far as the the morality of the parents even just in setting an example for their children that that will leave an impact on them for the rest of their lives and even gets into how

Christians nominal Christians can leave a negative Mark on their children in the future because they've seen hypocrisy and the like and so he concludes the essay by saying

Parenting is the most important task in the world. We're raising not just future generation, but Future Christians who will pass on the faith.

And so it's a it's a great essay Yeah, I know at one point. I'm looking for the quote and I can't find it, but he compares the love of God to the love of a parent and This beautiful passage where he talks about the sin that parents impart

To their children and then how their duty is to one of their duties that if they're a loving parent and a

Christian parent is to Help them know the Savior because in a sense

They've passed on this sin and now they're going to help them get get rid of it by going to Christ the same way

They did and I you know, I'm not doing it justice, but he said it in a very more flowery and beautiful way.

I thought What do you think? Dabney was facing in his own day that compelled him to write such an essay and then in our day

What do you think Dabney's voice could teach us about parenting? Yeah, I'm not exactly sure

What led him to? write that essay Other than just a deep conviction from the scriptures and he gets into the

Bible a lot Conviction that you know the role God has given parents and That that is to produce a godly seed or offspring as he quotes from Malachi What does it mean for us today, well things haven't changed, you know, we're still

Having children that's how you know humanity goes on and so I think this is a task that Christians need to take seriously and I mean one thing it can do is inspire us to have children

I think that's obviously something we're facing today is a declining birthrate even in the church,

I Think it's kind of become the norm where parents Think oh how many kids do you want?

And you know, they're now in the two to three range in the church where that you know That's it would have been a lot more back in Dabney's day

You know, he had six six sons three of whom died in Infancy, but people were trying to have more kids back back then because they knew the influence

That they would have on the future Yeah, you know I made this connection. I don't know if you did but the parental responsibilities section which you include first was in 1879 that he

Published that and then in chapter 2 secularized education that was the same year And so I just thought well these two fit together beautifully.

I think what he might be trying to tell us is that And we'll get to the secular education in a minute but is that parents need to first take their responsibility seriously for educating their children and which is included in nurturing them and raising them and providing and all of that and And this is not really the government's responsibility to do this.

This is something that God has given to parents and so So in the same way that he's against this secularized education he is for Parents and the role that they have in their child's lives.

I made that connection at least But uh, but you know, let's get into the the second one here so controversy time right secularized education

Dabney is Against it, right? I mean describe for me what he believes about education

Yeah, this is a fascinating essay, this is actually how I first got into Robert Dabney was through his writings on education

I'd seen some quotes. I was reading some some books on Christian education. I was like, whoa, this guy is impressive

And The the point of the essay it's an attack on the public schooling movement taking place as I mentioned in the south after the war between the states and You had some public schools in the south

But this idea of a statewide movement was pretty new It was first introduced in Massachusetts in the 1830s, and then it was making its way into the south after the war

And so Dabney believed that education was a task that belongs to parents first and foremost

So they didn't necessarily call it homeschooling back in the day But just the concept that parents are supposed to teach their children

You know how to live some basic tasks in life Maybe even reading and writing things like that.

So I want to stop you real quick so so I just heard that Garris essentially say without being presentist and taking the word homeschool and Repackaging, you know putting it back in the 1800s, but you the concept though.

You're saying this isn't a new crazy idea this has been around and this is

Was common in the United States before the Department of Education In the 1800s, so so this wasn't this isn't a new thing.

I guess is my point. Is that right? Yes Absolutely homeschooling was the

American tradition Especially in the south the Puritans, you know had the public schools in the

Northeast. They were local public schools not statewide but yeah, the southern tradition was

Homeschooling they would use private schools to aid the task and and so Dabney's fine with private

Christian schools He thinks that's great. He taught at one Was educated at these, you know kind of school houses, but they were private and they were

Christian And so they were very different from the public schools that we deal with today

Yeah, fascinating Yeah, so his concern then is that?

Education is going to be secularized as you said before because If you get everyone in a room and I think he even mentions

Muslims eventually he says they're minority now, but you know eventually You know, you're gonna have other sects and religions pop up and if we want to have

Everyone in the same room learning and you're gonna this neutral ground is going to be secularism

Which is in really in fact a new religion Which I think is the point that he makes is that this is this is a replacement of Christianity and based on that He predicts the sexual anarchy and and everything else that we're seeing today

And I guess we've lived, you know with since the 60s with Bibles being taken out prayer being taken out so forth.

So Yeah, and anything else that jumps out to you. I don't know if you had any favorite quotes or anything like that I mean the whole essay could probably be you could just like highlight the whole thing, right?

Yeah, that's Yeah, he says that a

Non -christian education is an anti -christian education. And I think that's an important line. He says it a couple times in there and so Dabney had no place for You know unbelievers in an unbelieving system educating

Christian children And so yeah, this is extremely applicable to To our own day.

He gives a lot of the arguments against that we can use today against our current public school system

And one thing, you know, he gets into some things you don't always think about. I mean, he really emphasizes how other children will actually be one of the largest influences negative influences on The children we place in public schools or that they can go for any school that's the pooling of ignorance idea

Yes. Yeah. Yes, and so it's not just about the unbelieving Instruction.

It's also just the whole influence and I think we need to take that into account when we're evaluating

You know educational options Yeah, it's interesting Dabney. You didn't include these essays, but Dabney Also wrote on geology in the

Bible and a caution against anti -christian science and he seems to have this idea that Education in general and knowledge,

I guess in general starts with as Proverbs says the fear of the Lord there has to be an understanding there before you can really get off the ground intellectually, which

I think may be what reminded me a little of been till when I was reading it, but It absolutely fascinating I'm gonna read one of the quotes

That this is the first time he uses the word anti -christian in the essay you've included But he says the concept of neutral or secular education is not only impossible

So he makes a philosophical argument. This is impossible. You can't have it, but it is in fact anti -christian and goes on to predict more of what would happen so Yeah, I think everyone would do well to to get this book and to read kind of in a more

Just an easier to read way with your headlines and everything the headers there what

Dabney is saying and And I appreciated that the next chapter that you've included as I said before, oh, man,

I just lost it. I I believe that was on See here women's rights and the yeah the and he's writing this in 1871 right?

So this is after Seneca Falls. This is actually after the war between the states But he makes some predictions here as well, what can you tell me about his predictions on what would happen?

If feminism was left unchecked and some of his critiques of the movement Yeah, so Dabney is dealing with first -wave feminism in the 1800s and He sees it as an attack on the family an attack on Christianity especially the idea of male headship and so he sees feminism as driving a wedge between husband and wife and Instead of seeing them as one flesh

You know one household It's dividing them. And so husband and wife will You know actually be strife with one another and so his prediction is that feminism is going to Undermine the family

Undermine, you know Christianity weaken the church It's gonna make the situation for women actually worse, you know, they thought it was providing freedom

But it was actually in Dabney's view going to make things much worse for them Yeah, there's a famous quote from this essay or is it this essay or is it the one about American conservatism

I think it's from this one. I marked this one. I love did you yeah, you want to give it or So he says

He's describing conservatism or specifically northern conservatism, which he says is the only opponent of women's rights at the time

And he says Northern conservatism. This is a party which never conserves anything its history has been that it demurs to each aggression of the

Progressive Party and Aims to save its credit by a respectable amount of growling but always acquiesces at last in the innovation what was the resisted novelty of yesterday is today one of the accepted principles of conservatism and I just think

I mean you could cite that for a number of issues, but You know, what are we actually conserving today?

I mean when you look at and politically or Yeah, you know, we're oftentimes so -called conservatives of the

Republican Party. They just adopt the latest Progressive policy and then make it their own.

Yeah, there's no principle He says American conservatism is merely the shadow that follows radicalism as it moves towards perdition

And this is said all the time in conservative circles, you know, you hear even on like talk radio to say well

Do you want to jump off the cliff, you know at you know, full speed or half speed, you know We're gonna get to the same destination either way

Republicans are just gonna do it more organized and in a smarter fashion And it rings true with a lot of the more like Tea Party conservatives because we're like, why aren't we balancing our budget?

You know, why are we spending like drunken sailors? How come you know, we've been to pro -life for how long and we can't really get much done, which hopefully that's changing

But yeah, there's this sense that we just sort of adopt The things that we fought before we just you know, they've become part of the party platform

You know like public education is a good example this was a controversy and now like no one even the most ardent conservative would think about eliminating the

Department of Education Well, maybe the most ardent but you know There's not many and they would probably be laughed out of the room.

You can't do that. That's you know fundamental, right? So you were arguing about health care now, and I'm preaching

I know but you know how long before that is part of a plank in the Republican Party platform that well free health care is

Also a right that the government must provide and we're gonna do it in a smarter way and that's what Dabney seems to be saying that There's no principle.

We're we're unrooted. We just Kind of we're the shadow that follows You know, he doesn't call it liberalism but radicalism which is probably a better word to predict absolutely

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, I think you know one of the You know,

I would say the the chief problem of conservatism conservatism today is

That it doesn't have a consistent ideology. And so Most conservatives can't

You know actually defend their positions. They're just trying to give reasons why we shouldn't adopt, you know, the latest progressive policy and So they end up just following this as Dabney says, you know

You have a lot of conservatives now wanting some sort of paid family leave policy, you know they don't actually get rid of Obamacare they just Repeat you know, they were supposed to Get rid of all of it instead.

They just got rid of they modified some of it But but the point being they don't argue for like a consistent principle such as free market health care or free market education

It's just given into the progressive Way, and it's it's sad and but Dabney can help us have a more consistent worldview.

I know Paul Gottfried I once heard him say that you know, America doesn't have a lot of conservative thinkers in its history, but he listed

Dabney as one of America's few conservative thinkers

That's interesting that he did that Because I you know, I was trying to think did Russell Kirk include

I mean he included Calhoun in his conservative mind But I think Dabney because of he was a theologian and he's primarily known as that he gets overlooked a little bit

But yeah in post, you know in Reconstruction era South he's probably one of the foremost political thinkers as well

And I don't know that he's gotten. Yeah, that's that's what's interesting is So what if he was a theologian?

I mean that actually I mean in my opinion should Help guide him in some of these things, but he wasn't just a theologian.

He was also a political thinker he addressed You know all sorts of these issues so Yeah, it's it's not it's not fair to leave

Dabney out of the discussion as many have. Yeah One of the things that I felt necessary to include in well

There's two things in this conversation about women's rights, which is your third chapter that you include of Dabney his essay there on women's rights

Number one. I think when we talk about first wave feminism the picture that people get is

Wanting the right to vote and that's pretty much it just women's suffrage you go back to You know, like Mary Poppins, right the suffragettes marching

That's probably the only image that a lot of people at least in pop culture have But in actuality and then this comes out as you read

Dabney's essay There's a lot more being smuggled in behind that there's a lot more to it

And I just know in my own study of the first wave feminism, you know, 1848 Seneca Falls They're doing seances in the basement read their

Declaration of Rights. I mean marriage is slavery It is radical stuff and that's what when

I hear conservatives saying well the third wave feminists, you know they really have the problem like well, yeah, they do but First wave feminists kind of got that ball rolling and it become because I think it is my own opinion here but they became untethered from any kind of biblical authority and of course

We were a Christian civilized. We were part of Christian civilization before And and this was kind of I think one of the first steps to Have this autonomy that we can have these concepts of freedom and liberty apart from the constraints that were put on them necessarily by by nature and by the special revelation that guided us so So they wanted women in the clergy

They wanted women in all professions and and this was radical especially at that time and And so when

Dabney's talking about it, you know, he's he's looking at I think this is right before but you know

The sentiment was still there things like Elizabeth Cady stats and you know Publishing the woman's rights Bible cutting out all the verses that had to do with women submitting to men or the creation role that God has ordained and so So this isn't just Dabney griping about women are gonna vote now

But that's not if you think that's what he's doing You need to read the essay because that wasn't the argument going on at that time

So, I don't know if you have anything to add to that. But do you agree disagree? I mean, that's the way I look at it

No, I completely agree. And this is something that needs to be said more often. Is that first wave feminism was?

you know the origin of later feminism and Modern feminism today has its roots in this movement and it wasn't just for the right for women to vote, but it was also

For really undermining marriage as you said Elizabeth Cady Stan was a radical she you know

Did not like a lot of things written in the Bible about gender roles and so she's downplayed today a lot of times they

People like to talk about Susan B Anthony because she was less controversial but Stanton had she has quotes about Wanting no -fault divorce like easier divorce laws and a lot of these things that the feminists got later down the road

There were also women pastors as you mentioned wrapped up in the movement And of course, they don't get the attention that Susan B Anthony does but even she herself was a

Quaker You know, this was not an Orthodox Christian and so yeah, yeah,

I mean people should study the the feminist movement more Yeah, yeah, and I know we're not here to just discuss that but it has to be kind of brought up in this discussion

You know, you do realize because of what you and I just said we will never be running for political office but that's okay.

I wasn't planning on it anyway, but Yeah, if you're a politician and you're listening and you agree with what we're saying just you might want to keep your mouth shut

But you know, so dad me, you know, whether you agree with all his critiques or not there's a general kind of attempt to bring scripture to bear on this topic and The other thing

I wanted to bring up with this chapter to transition is today. This is kind of an issue

I know you were mentioning to me before we started recording even in Presbyterian circles This is an issue, but I know in the

SPC right now with Beth Moore. This is an issue preaching You know, we have some of our

SPC seminaries women on the board so they're making decisions about curriculum for men and There's this idea

That a woman can really do anything as long as they're not ordained as a pastor

They could be the president of the Southern Baptist Convention. This idea has been floated now and I Got in it, you know,

I don't like getting in Twitter wars. I got into one though starting last night a little bit and About feminism and just to see what people are saying about feminism

It just my head spinning because it's just so detached from biblical truth

So, um, I think we know what Dabney would have said if you were alive today about those things

You know, but as you've interacted with Dabney as you've read some of his critiques. What would you have to say to?

modern PCA and SPC Folks that are in conservative denominations wanting to transition them into this more egalitarian mold well,

I think First and foremost, they're catering to the culture rather than basing their views and practices on on scripture scripture speaks very strongly about gender roles and you know men is having a position of leadership in the home and in the church and I feel the

What we're seeing today is Christians wanting to you know appease the culture in a lot of ways they want

Women we want to put women in positions of some sort of authority get him on staff roles and Leading Bible studies or whatever we can do to make it look like we're not sexist to the culture

And I think that that's just not how we should be doing things as Christians we should be going to the scriptures first Looking at what it says about men and women and gender roles and And going going from there rather than trying to please people who really don't care what we do

Anyway, I mean they're gonna call us, you know sexist homophobic bigots Anyway, so I just don't understand why we're trying to cater to these people.

Yeah, I would agree with you there I think one of the strengths of Dabney is he looks at the role of women and he elevates it and says this is what?

God created how beautiful is this and you want to go destroy it and You know, you're in an attempt to be like men you're giving up one of the greatest gifts

God's given you and I think that's powerful And and I don't hear a lot of that and maybe even from myself, you know,

I tend to get into discussions about okay well, what is Genesis chapter 2 say about women's role as a helpmate or you know, what does

Paul have to say and you know the three main passages that he talks about women's roles in the church and in the home and You know, maybe maybe

Dabney has something to teach us on this yeah, go for that, but also elevate who a woman is in the eyes of God and how that's unique and to be celebrated and I don't know, you know,

I don't know if we do enough of that, but yeah, just if I can comment there, I mean Dabney, you know, he sure gets this image of being the sexist guy who doesn't like women or anything, but Look, we need to understand people and at their time.

I mean, this was a man who had a wife I mean he cared very much for his wife if you read his letters and these things and if you read this women's rights essay he

You know has a lofty view of women. He he views a women as Needing to be protected and cared for and they have

The great task of motherhood and so he as you said, he just has this very high opinion of women but he understands that they're different from men and they have different roles and When you spurn those roles you are

Going to cause some problems and so, you know, one of the subheadings in this chapter is women spurning their protectors

He gets into that more in detail, but it it's the idea that feminism is actually throwing off male protection and That's part of why it's putting women in a purse worst place is leaving them vulnerable well, he uses words like they're gonna be corrupted and They have you know, he doesn't want to disparage them.

He uses the word disparage I'm not disparaging them But I am I am looking at the role that God gave them and wanting to champion that but there's a no in the section

That you I think I mentioned there's a story right about a man. Yeah, you want to tell that story real quick? see if I can recall it all there's a

Man on the was it a real Real wig. Yeah, I think I think he's sitting on a railroad

Yeah, exactly, right. He's sitting there going somewhere and the woman asks him for his seat you know won't you do the honorable thing give up your seat for a woman and The man says, you know, let me ask you are you part of the women's rights movement or are you a woman women's rights woman and she says yes,

I am and I don't remember his exact response, but it was something he says So He says

I will surrender it cheerfully meaning his seat madame as I always do but will beg leave first ask a civil question are you an advocate of the modern theory of women's rights and Bridling up with intense energy.

She replied. Yes, sir. Emphatically. I Let you know that it is my glory to be devoted to that noble cause and he says very well

Madam said he then the case is altered. You may stand up like the rest of us men until you can get a seat for yourself so I thought

I was Adaptee is like this is you know, this is what you want. You're gonna be treated like men.

So Yeah, it's a great. It's a great story Yeah The unless there was something else you wanted to add to the discussion of women's rights.

I wanted to jump to the last chapter I Want to maybe get into the idea of hierarchy, but I don't know if you want to wait on that Yeah, let's let's do that at the very end

Because I want we need to talk about that and we need to also Talk about what to do with Dabney because he's so vilified

So, you know you guys are talking about Dabney and you're saying positive things and we need to maybe have a little discussion on that But so let's talk about hierarchy after we briefly discuss his last chapter

The last chapter you include which is on ethics Frankly, I got through this pretty quick Because I didn't have a lot of time but it is a deep chapter and my takeaway was

Dabney doesn't like the the idea that Sovereignty rests in people.

He thinks that it rests in God and God is the one who ordains government and he outlines what kind of circumstances would arise that would require or allow us to as rebel against government if you want to use that term or You know cast it, you know

Illegitimate government cast it off and then in what circumstances to submit and so forth.

So it was fascinating and applicable Could you kind of walk me through what his argument is here?

Yeah, well, it's it's hard because he gets into a lot of aspects of government This is one of his more philosophical works in this book

Probably the hardest one to read. That's why I put it last I should mention there that Dabney was a philosopher.

And so he actually Gets into a lot of difficult issues at times so in the civic ethics essay, he's

Really laying the grounds for government. He says as you mentioned that government is founded by God It's instituted by God And so government has authority over us as citizens

He has to deal with some differing views. And so he criticizes The social contract theory the idea that we you know assented made some social contract

For this government and so he criticizes that he criticizes the divine right of Kings and and so in a lot of ways he's he's

Defending the American form of government republicanism He even defends the idea of separation of church and state

Although I should clarify he does not mean the modern version of separation of church and state

He simply means that you know We don't have state churches, which some of some of the

American states had state churches even into the 1830s You know this idea of Virginia where he was from, you know following Jefferson had separation between the church and and the state but he's not arguing that government should be separated from religious arguments or That kind of right.

He just believed in spheral authority the different spheres that God had ordained. Yeah Yeah, absolutely.

So he ends up dealing with a variety of Issues in here such as when we can rebel against tyrants and so he takes up some historical issues such as the

American Revolution and he ties it in with the war between the states and of course his position is that the

South in the war between the states was just taking up the same principles as the colonies did against Britain and American Revolution and so he's saying look this is we're just seceding which he thought was legal and and that was his position.

Mm -hmm Yeah, yeah, he does not like He doesn't seem to like John Locke very much, right?

He doesn't and there's a couple other philosophers that he mentions in their Hobbes does not like Hobbes right

Rousseau so he's criticizing a lot of these guys and It is it was intriguing and I actually want to go through it at a slower pace just so I can try to absorb his argument a little better, but It's a

Christian who's a philosopher who's also politically minded Get it, you know really grappling with these things and you just don't see that a lot.

It's deep thinking which I really appreciate Yeah, and that's an essay I've had to read it several times and I still don't remember everything that's in it that's that's one that people should if they're interested in government and You know philosophy of government.

That's an essay to read and reread. Yeah. Yeah. Well, you don't make me feel so bad now so Yeah, so that's the book and it's it's short.

You could probably read it in a couple hours and Get through it. I wanted to talk about what we just mentioned before so hierarchy and then

You know, why why look at Dabney so so what was Dabney's idea of hierarchy?

Why is hierarchy important? well, Dabney believed that hierarchy is essential to society civilization

And so this really sets him at odds with the modern egalitarian spirit which

I think has its origins or at least part of them in the French Revolution the Jacobins as he refers to where they wanted to You know basically abolish all distinctions between gender

Other roles in life and so it's this idea of equality or this, you know sameness they wanted

You know, they opposed hierarchy and so Dabney's at the opposite in the spectrum He's embracing the hierarchy as a good as something given to us by God And so this ends up playing out in a variety of roles

Obviously God is at the top. He has hierarchy over all of us. We submit to him but he's also instituted government as having authority over us and Then this also plays into the roles of you know husband being the head of the household and wives are supposed to submit to husbands and Children are supposed to submit to parents and it also ties in with his view on Slaves Obeying their masters.

Of course, he would also say masters as the scriptures say should treat their slaves well, so it really it plays into all of life and that that's why

I think this is an important topic and It comes up in a lot of his writings and it comes up in pretty much every single one of these essays in this book

Yeah, and it's funny the word equality or you know equal all the words in that family there they appear about 73 times

I don't know if you did a search on this, but I did and in the book He uses it a lot and yeah, he makes a distinction here.

He talks about Jacobin equality. Yeah, that adjective, you know, there's

Jacob inequality and he makes a distinction between that and Equality before God and this is you know, all these battles it seems like today in politics and in the church are

Fundamentally battles over the dictionary if your worldviews in collision and these secular humanists take words that meant one thing and then

Give them a new meaning and equality is one of these words that if you mention it today people

I think Automatically go to an egalitarian Mindset. Oh, yeah, like everyone should have the same political mobility

So, you know everyone should have an equal say no matter what their level of education, you know

Anything you know gender whatever the case may be everyone should have equal access to the same things equal opportunity equal outcome and that's equality and That wasn't it seems like when

Dabney was writing this term was in transition and we're on the other side of that now looking back Saying okay, the term has actually changed definitions

Now which it just fascinating to me because he's still fighting for this word. It's like no, this is

Jacob inequality We have actual equality before God, which is an equality of worth and the same needs spiritual needs like repentance and so Hierarchy is now the enemy of today's definition because the

Jacobins one of equality so if you support hierarchy now, you are against equality, which is like one of the core virtues of our

Socialistic Culture and so it's difficult to make these arguments and I think this transitions into why we why even defend

Dabney? Why do do something like a book on this? If this is a guy who believed in in that there were levels of authority that God had ordained

Not a popular idea now, so I mean are you are you concerned that People are gonna read this and get upset at you or how do you argue this to?

well, I mean people will get upset at me, I'm sure but I think that hierarchy is essential to Conservatism, I think it's actually fundamental to conservatism

But it's also fundamental to Christianity. And so I have no problem Defending it even though I know it's controversial and I mean hierarchy comes from God I mean, that's

Dabney's whole point is this is this is the world God has created and he's given us different roles in life and That's something we need to embrace.

It's not something to be rejected And so when you look at you know, he's contrasting the American concept of equality

Which as you said is, you know equality and worth or he says equality before the law hmm

That's the ideas is humans should be treated equally before the law or he calls it the equality of the golden rule and he actually gets into the

Declaration of Independence the preamble. He says look people are misinterpreting this and I hear this all the time and you see this with some of the

Neoconservatives actually they like to interpret the Declaration of Independence In this way

That all men are created equal and they say well look that's inconsistent with you know, even practices at the time

Well, maybe you're misreading the Declaration. Oh, yeah Maybe maybe that's not what

Jefferson And those who signed it meant is that everybody's the same. Of course, they wouldn't believe that that that's absurd

You know, they meant as Dabney's defending this equality of the golden rule before the law and what people are doing is they're embracing, you know, the

French Revolution view of equality egalitarianism and they're interpreting the

Declaration of Independence in this light and Yeah, but it really that's an atheistic

View it's it's not the Christian view. And so that's that's why I mean if people take just one thing away from this book.

I Think it's this point and I get into this in the introductory essay. So it's not just Dabney's Essays, I also try to explain this a little bit

But it's it's really important stuff and it plays out in a lot of these issues, especially with feminism today

I think that's a huge application of it Yeah, he he actually this is a in the book and the last

I think it's the last essay, but he says that He talks about equality and he says in British common law

The idea this would be the phrase used was equal before the law, which you just mentioned And he says all are equal in the sense that they have a rationale they're responsible and they have an immortal destiny and They're inalienable entitled to pursue that and and and that's really where it ends.

There's That's what equality meant to them and and of course in our conception we borrowed from the concepts of the

British Common law, so that's what it meant in the Declaration as well And and I think you're absolutely right to bring that up.

This mistake is made so often by Christian thinkers when they just smuggle in egalitarianism into the

Declaration. It drives me nuts as a historian as well That's not what it meant You know, and you know part of me wants to get into You know

Daniel Webster, I think it was Webster, but then of course Abraham Lincoln and then forward there is this

They constantly abuse the Declaration that way, but we won't go there But uh, but yeah hierarchy, you know, you said it's fundamental and another word that I came to my mind

Would you say that hierarchy is inescapable? Would you go that far or you yeah,

I mean if you're reading the same Bible as I am I mean it says a lot of things about Hierarchy, I mean for one this is a

Christian you you have to Submit to God he has authority over us and And there's other you know structures of authority over us government

Parents things like this. But yeah, it's also inescapable in the sense of somebody's gonna rule.

I mean, right I Mean look at even the the French Revolution. I mean they can embrace

Tell you they embrace egalitarianism all they want at the in the at the end of the day There's going to be rulers and it ends up being tyrants.

Exactly. Yeah, it's it's inescapable That's this is just the world we live in and we need to embrace the right form of hierarchy, which is

Christian hierarchy Yeah this is be controversial as everything we've been talking about is but hot in my mind hierarchy is it is

Liberty's defense mechanism from The what you just described a tyranny a tyranny of some kind, you know

Hierarchy is Liberty's defense against tyranny And if you don't have a structure that is capable of supporting even the weakest in a society the government's going to come in and say well you need us and then the only

Relationship is between an individual and this big heavy -handed government Which is what we want to avoid and I don't see how we avoid it if we don't have families and children

Husbands and wives and of course the other one that Paul talks about he talks about those two relationships

But in Ephesians chapter 6 and then in Colossians 4 He adds to those two slave and master as well.

And I you know It was a pagan slave system in the culture he was talking to but you know

Christians want to shy away from that and and I don't look at that as You know, we got to reinstitute

The kind of slavery that was in America at all But but just the idea that there are those who are in charge of a labor force

And then there are those who are doing the labor. So if you want to take that to business today there's a hierarchy there and you know this gets into private property and other things and it's all a needle in the eye of the government because the government doesn't have authority there so Dabney is just forward -thinking in my head when he looks at this and says hey we

We need some principles and hierarchy is one of the mainstays Now why why do this book?

Why? why get yourself into a Situation where people could look at you and say hi, you know, are you a bigot you supported

Dabney in this? I mean How should we think about someone like Dabney who let's face it?

He held slaves right and we don't like that today. So tell me your thoughts Well, first off I don't think this

You know people being uncomfortable with Dabney and slavery. I don't think it's gonna be limited to Dabney. We're seeing it with Just you know other positions as well

Whitfield With yeah, I mean just other men such as Whitfield Edwards Jonathan Edwards had slaves and as did

Thomas Jefferson George, Washington, so I mean Dabney was not alone as a man who held slaves in the

United States. So we have to ask the question You know, is it okay to Promote these men and I think the answer is yes

I think that there's nothing about Dabney that my mind disqualifies him from You know the the fact that we can

Read him study him benefit from his writings and even promote his writings and promote the man himself and so I mean he was an

Orthodox theologian. He was a moral man. He was a good man

Was he controversial even in his time? Yes in some ways But I just I just don't see

What would? Lead us to not be able to Promote him even if you don't agree with everything he wrote or said that's that's fine.

That's I think to be expected with anyone You know, and I don't think just because of his association with slavery that we should ignore him

I think that's to our detriment so At best even at those who disagree with him.

They have something to learn from him, right? You Are taking the extra step and saying well, not only do we have something to learn but we have something positive to learn

So there's something to promote here in some of these essays and I would agree with you I think the essays that you included are worth looking at and learning from and Promoting some of the concepts there because they're biblical.

He's just applying them to culture But uh, you know, there's an idea and we don't have time to flesh this out you know, we're kind of towards the end of our discussion here, but That there is this idea that Slavery is like the chief sin that it, you know racism slavery

Sexism you these are you know, you don't have like in the church Groups that are accountability groups for those who struggle with let's say racism, right?

Like you don't get it There's no compassion there as soon as someone says something that could be even taken possibly as racially insensitive

They are blacklisted forever At least I've seen that over and over and It's interesting to me because I believe you know racism is a sin obviously

Slavery though in and of itself is not now you can have bad slave systems. The Roman slave system was a bad slave system

I don't think they had gladiators in the American South, right but There there's a way to as Paul says participate in evil systems

As a Christian and be a salt and light in that system, you know, I think about the abortions happening in this country and Our tax money that might be going to it or think about the welfare system or think about you know

Sweat shops that create products that we buy in Walmart and stuff There's Ellen there's entryways into which we sometimes participate in these things, but we're not guilty of them and we can do so in A Christian way that brings hopefully salt and light to that And I would look at Dabney kind of that way is this he's he's not

Dabney says in the defense of Virginia in the South that Virginia was foremost in wanting to stop the slave trade.

He hated the slave trade and You know one of the reasons the Confederate Constitution outlaws it but he he you know

I think without reading the entire book here on camera Dabney said that there were many sins attached to it and he was against those things and tried to be

Biblical within the world that he was in which is I think what God expects of all of us, right in the context that we're in to serve him

So so you look today at a guy like MLK, right? And I'm sure you know, you've heard about the findings.

I think it was last week that were released of MLK In a situation where there was a rape going on He's giving advice on how to do it and he's laughing and all these horrible things

He's Grandstanded if I I think I created a word he's elevated right? He's he's a hero and he's celebrated as this messianic figure and yet his personal life is completely antithetical out of sync with scripture, you know his

He was a heretic in many ways just read his doctoral dissertation. There's no indication he changed from that But yet because of his

I have a dream speech He is Completely a hero and I think his

I have a dream speech, you know is great. We should champion that but he gets a pass and Dabney doesn't and and that's the interesting thing to me is is that That someone's so outside of the scope of orthodoxy and even just basic biblical

Fidelity is given this conference last year MLK 50 and yet Dabney is

You I mean Christianity they used to publish things about him in a positive light You can't get anyone to touch him with a 10 -foot pole now yeah, so that's my rant on that but You know,

I don't want to do more talking than you. I probably already have you have other thoughts on this on how to introduce

Dabney to an audience that Would just want to run away when they hear the word slavery

Hand in my book, that's That's a good No, I and actually

I I had to self publish this because I mean I didn't even try reaching a publisher because I knew they wouldn't want to publish it not not any main publishers you know banner of truth publishes some of Dabney's works they did him back in the 80s and Some of them are still available in print.

Sometimes you have to get used copies But yeah, this is somebody people want to avoid now. He's politically incorrect and Something's clearly changed in the last, you know, 30 40 years

It's not just Dabney. But I mean we're seeing it with him in the church And yeah, you contrast this with Martin Luther King jr

Look, it was known before last week that Martin Luther King jr Was an adulterer that he ran around on his wife that was that was already known and yet the gospel coalition had mlk50 last year

So, how do they defend that? I don't know. I mean a lot of people were critical of of them doing that I mean as you mentioned, this is a man who was a heretic and he was immoral and Something I would like to add to that is, you know,

Paul's words in 1st Corinthians 5 He's speaking of you know, someone who's alive But he says if someone calls himself a

Christian a brother and they're engaged in Unrepentant sin, you know adultery being one of them

He says don't even associate with this man. Don't don't even eat with him And so I have to ask why then even if that person is dead

He's a famous person and he called himself a Christian like Martin Luther King jr Did but was unrepentant in serious sin?

Why would you? Even associate with him and certainly why would you promote him?

Hmm and contrast that with Dabney. I don't think we can say that about Dabney as I said, he was Orthodox in his theology

He was a morally upright man And I know some people would say well he owned slaves.

Well as far as I know He treated his slaves. Well, he tried to follow the biblical principles

For slavery and at the end of the day we do have to take up the fact that Paul gave instructions

To slave masters, you know, he said slaves obey your master and he said masters treat your slaves.

Well You know Ephesians 6 Colossians 4 we have the book of Philemon You know,

I heard I heard I think it was Jared Wilson just the other day said that George Whitfield was attacking

George Whitfield and he said that if Whitfield was in his church and he refused to repent of his

You know ownership of slaves Essentially, he would excommunicate him. He'd kick him out of the church

But on what basis can you do this on what biblical basis, right? If the man is following the the biblical principles for slavery, you can't say he was in unrepentant sin

You know, even if the system itself had problems as Dabney himself pointed out, you know, he criticized the abuses of Slaves he criticized he hated the slave trade as you said, right?

I thought that was a great evil. And so Yeah, I think we just have to ask You know on what biblical basis do you say this man was in unrepentant sin?

Yeah, yeah, and I know I think especially later I've read a book by Eugene Genovese where he he liked

Dabney a lot like Thornwell and he kind of got disappointment pointed in some of them The Presbyterian theologians because he felt that after the war because of the way reconstruction happened they

And I don't remember the exact quote from Dabney But there was a sort of a lending of support to a segregation of sorts

And and of course, I would stand against that idea. I The reconstruction time period

I think has to be understood to understand why they did that but there really isn't a moral justification

For supporting that kind of thing. I think segregation is disgusting but that being said

I have to to look at someone in the time period that they're in and And so this is where presentism

I think is just a cancer that will eat away all of history Someone that that lives in a time of Dabney with the limited even though he was a brilliant man

He did not have the full knowledge that we do about Racial if we want to call it equality

That that we have today we live in this multicultural culture where we're just interacting with people all the time

And we see that every ethnicity is capable of doing pretty much every job and stuff

And Dabney didn't have the advantage of seeing things from that perspective and doesn't justify it totally

But what it does is it helps us I think It helps us sympathize a little bit with the time period he lived in and realized the constraints that were on him

These were the same ideas that were in the north And and even in Europe, I mean this wasn't anything that Dabney's views are not unique in any way on on that issue of You want to call it white?

supremacy, which would be like I guess the bad way to put it the negative way, but the the idea that Europeans were special in God's plan and they had knowledge.

They had the Industrial Revolution They had scientific explosion all these things and you know

That was the time he lived in and that's what everyone pretty much thought and and they wanted to go help

You know in missions efforts and so forth other cultures and countries and people groups but they did there was an air sometimes of superiority there and Something like adultery is so fundamental to Scripture and being wrong.

That was something MLK wasn't in a time where he just didn't know adultery was wrong, right? that was clear as day and and absolutely wrong and and and I think

You know, there are biblical principles that would speak to segregation and so forth but if you look at Dabney's writings on this topic, he's

He's not outside of the mainstream and for me I can look at a man like this and say, okay You know what Dabney's biblical views he's inconsistent in this area, but this isn't fundamental to who he is as a person

He's still an orthodox man. And and I hope when someone looks at me in the future They don't judge me as harshly as people judge

Dabney. I hope they can see okay John was inconsistent over here, but you know at the core of what he was aspiring to What he believed fundamentally that was intact and you just can't say that about MLK Or you know some of the other ones that are like James Cone who's being promoted now

Their heretics at the there's nothing redeemable at the bottom floor at the foundation, so So I think you've done a service and putting this book out there

We need to look at Dabney's ideas and we need to grapple with them There any final remarks you want to add before we end the interview?

I Mean, I would just say as far as your last comments, you know, Dabney was a man of his his time and You know, this is going to be the case really with anybody you read from the 19th century and so Just try to understand them, you know, you can disagree with them, but it doesn't mean you have to dismiss the rest of their writings and so Yeah, Dabney someone we should embrace.

We should read him and study him and learn from him and Yeah, if people want to learn more about my book

Dabney on fire comm has some more information it's available on Amazon I think people will like it.

I really that's why I I Put this book out. I want people to enjoy

Dabney's writings and benefit from them All right, go out there to dab me on fire comm or search for Dabney on fire at Amazon.

And Yeah, how can people be praying for you? Other than that, you know, people won't come and harass you at your house

Well, just I got some things going on in life I got to take the the bar exam End of July.

I'm getting married in August. So I have a lot going on But yeah, pray that people don't harass me over this book too much.

I don't think your wife would appreciate that. All right God bless that Going to me by now.