Gods, Kings and Mere Mortals

Evan Thomas made news last week. It is not known whether he was speaking for himself or for the entire editorial staff of Newsweek magazine, but here is the very cosmopolitan Mr. Thomas speaking to Chris Matthews on MSBC. "I mean, in a way, Obama's standing above the country, above--above the world, he's sort of God."

Wow. From mere mortal to “a sort of God” in five short months! But maybe we should pause a moment before elevating Barak Obama above emperors, kings and other assorted potentates. For as often as not, these god-like leaders turn their power against the very people who have chosen to be ruled by them. You do not have to look too deeply into the pages of history to find an A-list of scoundrels once considered god-like saviors. In the long course of human events, it is not difficult to find a palace full of such specimens from Nero and Caligula to Mussolini, Stalin, and Hitler. Luckily, Obama has not proclaimed himself to be God…yet.

Furthermore, if Evan Thomas were to look back to Old Testament history, he might not be quite so sanguine about the prospect of America being led by a “sort of God” president.
In the time after Moses and Joshua had died, Israel had no king. Eventually though, the people grew restless and so they demanded that a king be chosen. The people went to the prophet Samuel who turned to God for direction. God tells Samuel: “Listen to all that the people are saying to you; it is not you they have rejected, but they have rejected me as their king….Now listen to them; but warn them solemnly and let them know what the king who will reign over them will do.”

Samuel does what God commands: He warns the people that the king will take their sons and make them serve in his armies; he will take their daughters to be “perfumers and cooks and bakers; he will take their fields and a tenth of the produce from those fields; and he will take their flocks “and you yourselves will become his slaves.”(1Samuel 8:8-18)

Perhaps Evan Thomas and the editors at Newsweek should be careful about what they wish for. Didn’t our Founding Fathers rebel against the tyranny of kings? Isn’t it more reasonable to think of our president as a mortal rather than compare him to a “sort of God”? Wouldn’t the history of the American experiment suggest that we should resist the temptation to think of our rulers as anything other than mere men? Or would Mr. Thomas prefer to see America suffer the fate of so many nations who ceded power to an all powerful god-leader who then led the people down the well trod road to serfdom?