Worldwide Church of God: Speaking Evil

I just read Christian's emails to you and your replies from 2/1/00. Christian starts off asking "Did God say that we are to speak no evil of any man?" Since Christian probably thinks that God said this because of something he assumed was in the Bible, I thought it would be helpful to see what is really in the Bible and what it really says and means. For the purposes of discussion of Christian's assumption, I will assume in this email that the Bible is an accurate written account.

In Acts 23:5 the author of Acts wrote that Paul said "...it is written, You shall not speak evil of the ruler of your people." Paul was apparently quoting Ex. 22:28 which says "You shall not revile the gods, nor curse the ruler of your people." This last verse is part of a long passage supposedly being dictated by God to Moses, so we might think that God did indeed tell Moses and all the ancient Israelites not to curse their ruler. That is far different from not speaking evil of any man. And cursing your ruler is not the same as speaking evil of him, either. You and I speak evil of HWA, GTA, Stan Rader, Rod Meredith, and a host of others who claimed to be our spiritual rulers. If God is going to get us for telling the evil truth about HWA after he died and ceased being the big kahuna in charge of rape and pillage of his religious scam which he claimed was a church, so be it. These men set themselves up as rulers, claimed God had set them up, then began a systematic extortion of as many people as they could seduce into following them.

In Titus 3:2 the author of the book, which appears to have been a letter written by Paul to Titus, tells Titus (starting in ch. 3:1) to "Put them in mind to be subject to principalities and powers, to obey magistrates, to be ready to every good work, to speak evil of no man, to be no brawlers, but gentle, showing all meekness to all men." My question is who is the "them" that Titus was supposed to tell to speak evil of no man? Was it everybody in the church over which Titus was the spiritual leader? If so, then perhaps modern-day Christians should follow this suggestion of Paul. [It is Paul's written suggestion or command to Titus, and not God's command to all humans.] If we start reading at the beginning of the whole book to try to figure out who the "them" was that Paul had in mind who needed to be told by Titus to speak evil of no man, we see that Paul is telling Titus to instruct different groups of people in the church congregation(s) over which Titus had authority. First Paul tells Titus things to instruct ministers, then old men (whether ministers or not), then old women, then young men, then servants (I would assume this means slaves), and then he ends with more instructions to Titus himself. If you remove the artificially created chapter beginning, you will see that the suggestion to "put them in mind ... to speak evil of no man..." is a continuation of the section beginning with what Titus was supposed to tell the servants (slaves) who were members of his congregation. So not speaking evil of any man is something which Paul thought would be the best way for slaves to behave. That sounds like very good advice to me. If a slave wanted to live as happily and long as possible, he really ought not to be speaking evil of anyone. There is no indication that Titus was to give this particular instruction to everyone in general.

If we want to obey all of Paul's instruction to Titus, then we should certainly want to see ch. 1:5-8 enforced, in which Paul condemns HWA, GTA, Rader, and all the other evil tyrants who raped our minds and pillaged our pocketbooks for so many years. Here is what Paul had to say about such evil men: "...ordain elders in every city...[these men were all elders in the church]...if any be blameless [can you be blameless if Geraldo Rivera shows a videotape on national television in which you are masturbating while chasing a masseuse around a room trying to rape her?] ... the husband of one wife [with how many women do you have to commit adultery before you violate this one?] ... having faithful children not accused of riot or unruly [was HWA's child GTA ever accused of riot or being unruly?] ... a bishop must be blameless ... not self-willed [HELLO??? Was the grand old Perbert self-willed or what?] ... not soon angry [did HWA have a filthy temper?] ... not given to wine [how many nights in a row do you have to be drunken from Dom Perignon before you can be said to be given to wine?] ... not given to filthy lucre [was there ANYONE at all in a high church office who was not given to filthy lucre?] ... sober...temperate." Our former cult tyrants are further described in verses 10-16, which say "...there are many ... deceivers... teaching things which they ought not, for filthy lucre's sake... They profess that they know God, but in works they deny him, being abominable, and disobedient, and reprobate to every good work." How abominable is someone who secretly commits incest with his daughter for 13 years while publicly proclaiming to be a minister of God and teaching others not to be sexually perverted? Am I speaking evil of HWA when I say this now? HWA spoke evil of himself by his lifelong filthy and disgusting behavior.

Peter was apparently writing a letter to church members in general when he condemns in 2 Peter 2:9-12 people who "...are not afraid to speak evil of dignities" and who "speak evil of things that they do not understand". Should HWA, GTA, Rader, Meredith, et al. actually now be considered as "DIGNITIES"? We used to exalt these arrogant, selfish, Nazi, bastard tyrants. Not any more. They were not dignities then and they are not now. They are low-life scum. Are we speaking evil of things we do not understand? How hard is it to understand that a church leader is to be the servant of all, humble, gentle with all, teaching with meekness, etc.? How hard is it to understand that we should not commit incest, lie, take tithes under false pretenses, commit great physical and spiritual whoredoms, and spend money lavishly on ourselves that others sacrifice in order to give us? We speak evil on this website of things which we thoroughly understand to be evil.

In Jude's letter to the general church membership, it is written in verse 4 that "...certain men crept in unawares, ... ungodly men, turning the grace of our God into lasciviousness...". We used to have a cult leader who molested his daughter, telling her that God had given her to him (for the purpose of molestation, evidently). HWA and GTA both felt they were given special license by God to act however they pleased. They turned grace into lasciviousness for themselves. It is people like this of whom Jude was speaking in verse 8 when he said "...these filthy dreamers defile the flesh [through all manner of sexual perversion], despise dominion [read HWA's 1939 article on church government to see how much he despised any dominion that might attempt to control him], and speak evil of dignities."

If Christian can tell us where in the Bible he thinks we are told never to speak evil of any other human, I will be glad to scrutinize that passage as well.

There are plenty of commands in the Bible to speak the truth, to go to your brother in private to discuss his evil behavior, and then to tell the whole church if he refuses to hear you. If you obey that command that Christ gave to his disciples in Matthew 18, you are required to speak evil of someone when you tell the whole church.

Do not duplicate, copy or redistribute in any form without prior written consent.

Disclaimer