On lies

I overheard something that has been bouncing around in my head.  A woman was talking to a couple of her friends, and I overheard her say, "I don't care, I'll lie if I have to."  I didn't hear anything leading up to this statement, and I didn't hear the words of her friends' reply.  I could hear the tone of her friends, however, and they sounded agreeable - not like they were correcting her.

To me, this is an example of the evil that we in our society in this time in history are the most likely to encounter.  I'm not saying the woman is evil - not at all - I think everyone has ways in which they are good and everyone has ways in which they are not so good.

And, I don't really think that a lie told in the heat of the moment is the best example of evil.  Evil is scarey.  Lying when caught with your hand in the cookie jar is not all that scarey.  It's more an example of our everyday fallen state.  It's the kind of lie that, if you're given some time to think about things, you are apt to confess.  It's the kind of lie that we're all prone to do, and so we understand that a statement made by someone just caught doing something they shouldn't be doing might well bring about a lie.  Since we expect it and understand it, it isn't all that damaging, and so it isn't all that scarey. 

But, to actually plan to lie, and to proudly announce it to your friends, and for your friends to be supportive of that decision, that is for me the scarey kind of lie.

So, what if there is a good reason to lie?  What if Hitler had been caught instead of killing himself, and what if you were told your testimony was needed to convict him, and he will go free if you don't lie?  Would that be ok?  Actually, I think that would be the absolute worst time to lie.  First, although God can take bad actions and do good things with them, that doesn't justify doing bad things, even if you think the reasons are good.  Second, lying with the intent to bring about pain and suffering to someone is completely different than lying to protect yourself.  Third, note that the reason given for lying is that there isn't enough evidence to convict unless you do.  If that were not the case, then you wouldn't even be thinking about lying.  But, if your testimony is needed to convict, ie if you have a reason to lie, then you are in effect replacing the entire judicial proceeding with your own judgment.

We're told to not judge others, which is a very problematic command in many ways.  But not in this scenario.  Of all the ways of interpreting the command to not judge others, surely putting ourselves in the position of being the final say on another person's guilt or innocence - and using a lie as the means of doing that - that must surely fall smack in the middle of the prohibition against judging others.  [Exodus 20:16, 23:1-7]

But, the woman I heard most surely wasn't going after Hitler.  Hitler did exist, so don't take this the wrong way, but for almost all of us, almost all the time, there are no Hitlers in our lives.  Most likely the woman was afraid that she was going to get in trouble for something and she was saying she would lie if she had to in order to get out of it.

If that is the case, then note how this differs from getting caught with your hand in the cookie jar.  In this case, she isn't caught in the heat of the moment.  She instead she is actually planning on lying in the future.  That to me is not as bad as lying to harm another (that is, for example, lying in order to convict Hitler).  I was going to say it was the second worst kind of lying, but then I thought of other types that are worse - such as lying to promote yourself, or lying as gossip.  Gossip is probably the worse kind of lying that we run into on a daily basis - and this particular woman is a big gossip.  I often hear her changing the facts in her gossip just a little here or there in order to make it more interesting - and by making it more interesting she's making it more damaging to the person being gossiped about.  Hopefully, though, she wasn't proudly announcing to her friends that she was planning on lying in her gossip.            [perhaps a separate entry about gossip?]

Nonetheless, she was actually planning on lying, and she had the support of her friends.  So, why was she planning on lying?  I don't know, but it seems likely she was trying to protect herself.  If so, I have to wonder why it would be worth it. She might get in trouble with the boss about something.  But when you're in that situation you own up and take your thumps.  I've found bosses usually actually respect you more in the long run if you do that.  And, if caught in the lie, you're apt to do more harm to yourself than if you just took your punishment. 

She might well not actually lie when push comes to shove.  I might actually have caught her in the heat of the moment - not of being caught but of anticipating the possibility of being caught.  She might have just figured out that she was about to get into trouble for something and so she was, in her mind, in the scenario of being caught with her hand in the cookie jar.

Ok - that would take her statement into the category of not so scarey lies.  But it still leaves her friends.  They should be advising that she not lie.  Or if they're not brave enough to do that, then they at least should remain silent.  But to actually be making sounds of encouragement?  Now that is perhaps the scariest part of the whole exchange.  That is the seed of the mob - of the witch trials - of the Red Scare - of so much of the great evil we see in the world.