Bishop N.T. Wright, for whom I have enormous respect as an historian and New Testament scholar, illustrates (sadly!) how true it is that a man speaking authoritatively outside his realm of expertise makes for truly discouraging reading.
Well-known Christian philosopher Gilbert Meilaender (Valparaiso University), takes N.T. Wright to task in the February 2007 First Things journal for showing little depth of understanding or nuance in his pronouncements on geopolitical issues. It is the more sad because Wright is known for extraordinary thoroughness in Biblical studies.
A link will be forthcoming to Meilaender's article when the February 2007 First Things issue goes online. [Here it is.] For now, let me just say that Wright faults the United States' Iraq policy in the most strenuous of terms, without benefit of the theological and political seriousness befitting his position.
A few quotes from Meilaender (which in no way does justice to the whole article):
When one considers the volumes that have been written by political theorists and political scientists on the nature of political institutions, one ought
to be struck by how little Bishop Wright actually seems to have thought about these instutions before venturing forth on the sea of political analysis. . .
Bishop Wright is not wrong, of course, to note that "all authorities and governments face the temptation to become bullies and arrogant"; yet, the bullying and arrogant tone of his own critique suggests that the response "Physician, heal thyself" would not be misplaced. . .
I cannot find in that analysis the mature political judgment for which Bishop Wright calls. It fails to pay close attention to who is actually doing much of the killing now taking place. It fails to pay attention to who is actually observing rules of war and who is not (an unsurprising failure in one who thinks that making war on terrorists is simply fighting "one kind of terror with another," an astonishingly imprecise analysis). And, perhaps most of all, it misses the (quite possibly misguided) idealism that has to a large extent undergirded our venture in Iraq.
One despairs even more of the bishop's powers of political analysis when one considers the alternative policies he offers...
I don't have time to discuss Wright's first suggested alternative policy (working for mutual understanding and an attempt to discover what makes people tick within worldviews quite unlike our own), except to quote Meilaender who says "responsible government officials must also use and be prepared to use force against those whose willingness to commit inhumane acts is announced and well known.
On Wright's second suggestion. Meilaender says:
The second suggestion to emerge from Bishop Wright's analysis is that multilateral rather than unilateral global military action is needed: a better functioning United Nations and International Court of Justice. "To continue to resist the making real of such an internationally credible police force, as many on the right in America have done, is more and more obviously a way of saying that now that we're in power we will use that power utterly for our own advantage." Here again, Bishop Wright is not much given to argument in support of his advice. It is not clear why we should--to borrow again from Michael Walzer, who is hardly a man on the political right in America - be "convinced that the world would be improved by having only one agent of international rescue." Moreover, until the day when the kingdom of Christ is fully established, there is in the political world no universal mediator of God's rule, and we may therefore have both theological and political reason to prefer a pluralistic world with many centers of power and sovereignty.
Ah, N.T. Wright... what a disappointment that you weren't wise enough to resist the temptation to make pronouncements in areas far from your expertise. I really am surprised and, of course, not a little disappointed.