"If
Luther’s interpretation is correct, the eighth commandment is an epistemic
principle: it has to do with figuring out when we have found the truth about
our neighbor. When it comes to the assessment of our neighbor’s words and
deeds, we should ‘find ways of excusing him, speak well of him and make the
best of everything’ – or as it is often rendered, ‘put the best construction on
everything (Small Catechism I.16). This is not just a rule of etiquette. We
cannot keep this commandment by first discovering what we suppose to be the
hard truth about another’s words and deeds, and then politely keeping quiet
about, or softening up the rough edges. The commandment not to bear false
witness surely cannot be an injunction to dissemble. Rather, obedience to this
commandment has to enter into our very effort to discern the truth about our
neighbor in the first place; we cannot suppose that we have got the truth about
our neighbor’s words and deeds until we are sure we have put the best possible
construction on them. In just this sense, presumably, the apostle Paul enjoins
us to speak the truth in love, and warns against ‘evil talk,’ namely that which
fails to build up and give grace to those who hear (Ephesians 4:15, 29). If we
sense a conflict between what we want to say about our neighbor and that
kindness and tenderness of heart without which we grieve the Holy Spirit
(Ephesians 4:30, 32) we have a sure sign that we have so far failed to find the
truth, and have fastened onto falsehoods of our own invention."
--
Bruce Marshall, quoted by Eugene Rogers in Sexuality and the Christian Body, p.
33
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