Lament and Celebrate: How Are We to Remember the Ambiguities of History?

Reflecting on Juneteenth, I am pondering the ambiguities of how we remember history. To be sure, Juneteenth rightly celebrates a pivotal milestone in the journey toward justice and liberty in US history. Behind the jubilee remains a painful, persistent injustice and oppression that calls for lamentation. Out of the lament of generation after generation of slavery came the celebration of emancipation. Out of the struggles of living in the unexplored territory of emancipation came the lament of more generations of injustice. Out of that still incomplete endeavor rises the celebration of progress. Taking a cue from the Hebrew Prophet Habakkuk, history may be understood as a relentless rhythm of lament and celebration. Often lament and celebration are a messy muddle.

My observation on this Juneteenth is that we are in the midst of a most messy muddle. Perhaps the momentum of the movement for justice in the face of clearly unjustified killing of Black folk portends a new celebration of justice and liberty. At the same time lamenting civil unrest understandably evokes lament of the loss of peace and security. Mingled in this is the controversy over monuments to people and events of the past that are also tangled between lament and celebration. The movement to remove monuments that celebrate injustice and oppression is met with cries not to forget history but to learn from it. How do we journey from celebration to lamentation? Clearly not everyone is at the same place on that journey.

The juxtaposition of lamentation and celebration is painful. One part of the pain comes from lamenting the injustices and oppression of the past. Another part of the pain comes from a longstanding celebration of people and events that are coming under increased scrutiny and prompting lamentation.

The Auschwitz death camp has been preserved so that horrible history will not be forgotten but eternally lamented. However, no statues honoring Nazi officers stand there. Yet, in the immediate aftermath of World War II, the people of Germany struggled to come to terms with this part of their history, which is still not fully resolved. Yes, lament for the horrors of that time. Yes, celebration of the heroes who resisted and were often crushed in that darkness. I think what the Nazi era celebrated was rising out of lamenting the humiliation of defeat in the Great War (World War I). What followed was not just the defeat in World War II, but the lamentation of a nation divided through the Cold War. Though hardly complete, reunification has echoed with celebration. Still remains the ambiguity of how to lament and celebrate figures such as Richard Wagner who was celebrated by the Nazis and still unsettles in Germany, Israel, and elsewhere.

 Ambiguities are inherent in each of us and our daily lives and in the cultures and societies in which we live. Just the last couple of weeks my Scripture reading has included the story of Abraham in Genesis and the way Paul portrayed Abraham in Romans. Romans makes out Abraham to be an unwavering bastion of faith. Yet, Genesis reveals serious flaws and foibles and floundering of faith. Is Abraham to be lamented or celebrated? I answer, “yes.”  

In US history Thomas Jefferson is just such a confounding amalgam. The one who wrote “That all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.” also owned slaves and fathered children by Sally Hemmings, a young slave woman he owned. Some have suggested they may have had mutual affection, but the power differential would make that questionable at best. To be sure, Thomas Jefferson was a genius who greatly shaped the founding of the US. Nevertheless, he was a flawed and contradictory human being. So we celebrate his contributions while simultaneously lamenting his inconsistencies. Back in May I wrote my own comparison of Jeffersonian liberty with biblical liberty. http://nstolpewriting.blogspot.com/2020/05/freedom-and-liberty-apostle-paul-and.html

We are all susceptible to the “fish will never discover water” phenomenon. We are so immersed in the context of our lives that we have a very difficult recognizing what to lament and what to celebrate. This seems also to be the point of Hans Christian Andersen’s 1837 tale The Emperor’s New Clothes. I think that is behind the Psalmists plea to God, “Who can detect their errors? Clear me from hidden faults.” (19:12) This is one reason that those who have experienced injustice and oppression are such important voices. They help us see what easily escapes our notice.