By Stephen Smoot
“Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, and cometh down from the Father of lights” reads James 1:17.
A “perfect gift . . . from above” represents a blessing, a gift from God from his infinite Grace. These can include “spiritual blessings in heavenly places in Christ,” as it states in Ephesians.
Not too many decades ago, “blessing” had a more general meaning. The word “blessing” described some attribute or development that could help an individual or group of people somehow in their endeavors or in life itself.
Calling these things “blessings” recognizes their innate goodness, acceptance that these “gifts” from God do not represent His intent to elevate an individual over anyone else. In most cases, blessings mitigate challenges, whether from within or without. Some parts of the Bible regard them as “rewards” for service to God, but the Book of Job shows how the righteous man does not always get rewarded in the manner one might expect.
At some point, the notion of advantages in life lost their sense of divine origin. What people once regarded as “blessings,” they now considered in a different context, that of economics.
Whereas blessings came from the intellectual and spiritual realm of Judeo-Christian belief, that of “luxuries” comes from the Latin. Two related words form the origin. “Luxuria” meant objects or acts representing wealth and splendor, while “luxus” meant immoderate, intemperate, promiscuous, and other Sins of the Wolf.
Through the Middle Ages, the word held tight to its sinful connotation, but in the approach of modern times, France modified the word. Even in the 1700s, French fashion houses directed the elite tastes of Europe, from imperial and royal houses to the nouveau riche traders and merchants. In this realm, “luxury” became a positive attribute or a neutral term denoting a level of opulence.
Luxury in modern times has no moral, ethical, or sinful connotation. As the 20th century ended, however, things once described as “blessings” now were said to be “luxuries.” The morality of a luxury lay in how a person or people used the advantage described as such, a more utilitarian and economic style outlook, but one that seemed to deny the agency of God or grace.
Not until the 21st century did the ideal of a blessing or a luxury sour into one of unnecessary and often unearned social resentment.
The word “privilege” itself has evolved many times before its current odious connotation. In the late Roman Empire, the term denoted a law passed in favor of an individual, mostly in terms of that person, or people’s, being relieved of having to follow a law or regulation.
In other words, a waiver from certain legal requirements.
Through the Middle Ages into the modern period, the word kept much the same definition and meaning as a legal immunity or exemption. In modern American legal usage, however, its meaning has expanded somewhat.
American law recognizes a difference between “privilege” and a “right.” Traditionally. Americans see “rights” as coming a priori from God or Nature, depending on that person’s beliefs. The law recognizes certain rights as “inalienable,” or part and parcel of American citizenship, though recognition for a number of vital reasons is not necessarily extended to non citizens. The government’s role in rights is to protect those of its own citizens from infringement by the government itself or others.
While many believe this to be true, too many others assume rights are merely “things the government lets you do.”
The Bill of Rights and a number of others established by the United States Supreme Court, case and common law, or practice serve as aspects of a person’s existence that can only be infringed upon via due process of law. Often, that due process is from criminal law.
“Privileges” cover a different group of individual, collective, or corporate activities. These are not rights, per se, but categorized as “things the government lets you do.” Driving a motor vehicle is not a right, but a privilege. The government can deprive individuals of this right through civil actions, not only criminal.
For example, a person who falls behind in child support payments in a number of jurisdictions can lose the privilege to drive.
Academia weaponized the term privilege and used it in some cases to denote certain aspects of a person that provide advantage in any given situation. Most commonly, those who weaponized privilege cited “whiteness” as an innate aspect conferring privilege in all cases whatsoever.
It was used as an overtly racist sledgehammer in political, economic, social, and criminal contexts, and wrongly so. Circular argument formats that excluded any white person’s, especially males,’ right to defend themselves against “privilege” accusations were employed, mostly in higher education and vocations dominated by Leftists.
This was called “education” at the highest levels of too many colleges and universities for too long.
No one who has personally gone into the hollers of some of the most challenged parts of West Virginia, seen families ravaged by the opioid epidemic, poverty, and the well-intentioned, but disastrous policies periodically undertaken to “help” could ever call these people “privileged” due to simply being white.
They endure social problems related to their economic condition, family reputation, and other aspects of their life, often quietly and without complaint, usually over many generations.
From the 1800s until the late 1900s, too many of these people were granted the hateful moniker “white trash.”
Privileged indeed.
But the word in the 21st century has encompassed what once were called “blessings,” then “luxuries,” cloaking any advantage deemed unworthy by academic gatekeepers as an evil privilege. Leftists in authority forced those within their grasp to undergo “self criticisms” of the type engineered by Lenin and Stalin’s Soviet Union and Chairman Mao’s Red China, mostly because their Leftism was on a similar level. They had to “confess” their privilege and ask “forgiveness,” even for events that transpired prior to their birth, in demeaning ritualistic ways.
The worst aspect of this etymological evolution is how it reflects the change of human nature over the generations. “Blessings” are good things and all celebrated when a person or people received them, even if they themselves would never derive benefit.
“Privilege” became a mark of shame in some circles, something to vocally condemn, even if inherently good.
As the Thanksgiving holiday passes, Advent sets in, and the joyous holidays of Christmas, New Years, and either Old Christmas or Three Kings Day await the time for celebration, let us resolve to celebrate when good things happen to good people and set aside the resentment that can come when some get blessings to enjoy, but we do not, for whatever reason.
Blessings come to all within the mystery of God’s plan. Not all at once, not consistently, and always on His timetable instead of ours. It’s best to seek out, recognize, and, most importantly of all, appreciate, one’s own blessings in life without looking through the opaque clouds of resentment or envy.
That is how we work to restore the America of days gone by, where people could disagree in some ways, but work together in others. Give grace.
