The United States of America in the twenty-first century is a profoundly angry culture, and in contemporary discourse anger (often labeled “outrage”) is almost regarded as a virtue.
By starkest contrast, when the Lord Jesus and his apostles teach about human anger their message is fairly simple and pretty clear. Anger is spiritually dangerous and often is simply equated with sin. Does the Bible teach a category of “righteous anger” on the part of Jesus’ disciples? I would say, “not really.”
To be sure, there is a place for anger, and for vengeance. But it does not belong to the disciples of Jesus. That prerogative belongs to God alone…
…to read the rest of what Professor Gibbs has to say, click over to his new essay “The Myth of ‘Righteous Anger’: What the Bible Says About Human Anger.”
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