Hungarian Church Press, 1968 (20. évfolyam, 2. szám)
1968-06-01 / 2. szám
HOP Vol XX Special Number 1963 No 2 15 -(07657) enemies Never, under no circumstances, can we consider one as the absolute enemy* We nay have opponents, those having opinions other than ours, but , in the ordinary sense of the word, we may have no enemies* The command of Jo-sus Christ to pray for Our enemies entails the obligation, under,the present so-’ cial conditions, to work for the relativization of the conflicts between men-. * * * 2) The Situation as a Problem of Christian Ethics \ a) The Main Characteristics of Our Time It is in the contesi of the efforts to humanize the forms of sccie.l life that humanism becomes a problem of social ethics. Our basic thesis is the. the primary form of this effort today is the social revolution*^) It is this factor of primary importance that determines the situation in which we - both in the East and in the West - live today«. And it is with reference to this situation that we must understand and perform our obedience to Godg b) The His torijai Situation and the Ethical Principle Our attention to the concrete will of God that is implied in the historical situation makes us refrain from, two ethical Attitudes: one of then is legalism - whether it appeals to natural law or the Biblical laws - and. on the other hand, fron antinómián!sm or ''decisionism11 which, with its appeal to the absolutized lav/ of love, refuses to accept any guidance,but from intuition, the suggestion of the moment* Tv'e understand the intention of the situation or contextual ethic which, as a correction cf the two extreme positions, "enters the situation of our decision armed with principles of universal validity and yet prepared to change, suspend or even break any or all principles and general rules, if it is the matter of thereby better obeying the commandment of love toward our neighbour in a given situation"0 But is this conception of the situation ethio a new one? Or is it only now that we have attained to sufficient maturity to understand and take really seriously what had already been said and known? Je Fletcher refers to Dietrich Bonhoeffer who is also mentioned, in connection with the situation ethic, by H* Ott, while pointing to Bonhoeffer*s spiritual kinship with Martin Bub or* 14-) The latter, like Bonhoeffer, stresses that there are indeed, "eternal wards", commands, but these can only be interpreted in the context of our historical situation* The eternal conmands are embedded, and can only be recognized in the process cf historyo It is not ourselves that produce the ethical values and norms, but v/e discover them when, in a definite situation we obey theme
