When we think of a good person, we form images in our minds, of an old and frail Mother Teresa, veiled and bent over in deep devotion, and occasionally looking up to quip some profound quote about kindness and feeding the hungry. We hardly ever conceive of goodness as constituting such words as bravery, opposition, fighting, challenging, drawing lines, and setting boundaries.
This cultural concept of goodness could not be farther from the truth. In reality, true goodness looks like bravery and piety, niceness and drawing lines, accommodation and opposition, self-sacrifice, and setting boundaries, standing side by side, not as opposite, but as complementary stances. It need not be one without the other.
A famous historical figure said it this way: “Behold, I send you forth as sheep in the midst of wolves. Be ye therefore wise as serpents and harmless as doves” (Matthew 10:16, KJV).
This figure, the Jewish philosopher Jesus of Nazareth, who also happens to be Christianity’s central backbone, was by no means himself a soft sissy bereft of one. He embodied an elegant militarism, often and readily going head to head with his detractors in intellectual discourse, debating them and summarily silencing them. He was not afraid to disrupt the status quo. Neither was he iffy about challenging convention. In fact, causing havoc, it seems, is all he ever did. Given the viciousness of his enemies, his method was very effective.
Similarly with the wolves within our cultural, political, and corporate spaces getting ever emboldened in their desire to deceive, manipulate, control, and dominate, we are going to need something a little more than the conventional turn-the-other-cheek goodness. It is necessary more than ever to embrace, cultivate, and apply the wisdom of the serpent alongside our goodness, which is the innocence of doves.
Our dealings with the world; in our workplaces, creative circles, and yes, even our churches will not always be executed with democratic and diplomatic elegance only. Every now and then, we also ought to step in with bold, lionish confrontation and the ever-so-sleek serpentine manoeuvre.
