Guilt By Association

If you can’t beat them on the merits, try to make them look bad.

Such seems to be the logic, however consciously or unconsciously manifest, by those who advance the logical fallacy of guilt by association.

Guilt by association, sometimes called appeal to spite, takes place when a person attempts to associate a person or a set of arguments or ideas with a person and/or a set of arguments or ideas which their audience already regards with ambivalence, hostility, and/or resistance. Guilt by association is a part of the family of association fallacies, in which it is alleged two things must share the same properties if they prove part of the same group. Likewise, guilt by association exists within the domain of ad hominem fallacies, since it often features a person being attacked or slandered as opposed to addressing the substantive claims the person would advance.

Christians are tempted to commit the guilt by association fallacy in many contexts for a host of reasons. Sometimes the accusation of guilt by association proves quite concrete: a Christian will speak of another Christian as in sin or bringing disrepute upon the cause of Christ, not because of anything he or she believes or practices themselves, but purely on the basis of maintaining some level of association or fellowship with another Christian who, in perception or reality, believes and/or practices in ways which the first Christian finds objectionable. Such accusations can develop their own “daisy chain”: the problem with Christian A is they maintain association with Christian B who is the one who maintains association with “objectionable” Christian C, and this can go on ad infinitum until every Christian in the world becomes guilty by association!

The New Testament provides appropriate warnings to Christians regarding the kind and level of associations they should maintain with those who profess to follow Jesus but either teach falsely in ways which corrupt and adulterate the apostolic Gospel of Christ and/or persist in disobedience and immorality which has been confirmed by the mouth of two or three witnesses (Romans 16:17-18, 1 Corinthians 5:1-13, 15:33, 2 Thessalonians 3:6-15). John did condemn those who provided greeting, hospitality, and thus material advantage to the docetists who denied the humanity of Jesus (2 John 1:6-11); but in their behavior such Christians became joint participants in the wickedness of those who were antichrist. Yet in these regards each will stand or fall before the Lord Jesus (cf. Romans 14:10-12): we have every right to warn a fellow brother or sister in Christ regarding such an errant Christian with whom he or she has maintained significant associations, but we have no ground, right, or standing to judge or condemn them for whatever they decide to do with that information. Neither Jesus nor the Apostles ever gave Christians the right to judge others for what their perceived associations, especially on matters of far less significance than those which concerned John. Those who would make such judgments and condemnations should be rebuked for their presumptuous arrogance; if they will not hear after two such rebukes, they should be treated as divisive people and rejected according to Paul’s exhortation in Titus 3:10-11.

Christians tend to be more tempted to commit the guilt by association fallacy in terms of various doctrines and practices. There is often an almost overexuberant eagerness to attempt to associate any doctrine or practice with which one is uncomfortable with some religious organization with whom we maintain significant disagreements and/or to lump a person and/or what they have been teaching and doing with some well-known infamous person considered a false teacher by at least a faction of brethren.

Many times, there will be at least some type of connection or relationship which exists in reality between the person/doctrine/practice and the group or person with whom they are being associated; this relationship often seems to legitimate the fallacy in the minds of many hearers or readers. For example, many brethren prove uncomfortable with the eschatological perspective expecting a restored earth and/or a “new heavens” and a “new earth,” and will often attempt to associate such doctrines with the Jehovah’s Witnesses. Yes, the Jehovah’s Witnesses, as part of their eschatological perspective, imagine the existence of a restored earth on which many will live. But they imagine the “new heavens” will be populated with the 144,000 elect within their doctrinal framework, with anyone else who does not go to hell relegated to the restored or new earth. The Jehovah’s Witness perspective on eschatology, furthermore, proves utterly reliant on dispensational premillennialism.

Many faithful brethren have confidence in a “restored” earth/”new heavens and new earth” eschatological perspective but reject the doctrines of the Jehovah’s Witnesses regarding the elect and dispensational premillennialism. Such represents a classic example of the guilt by association fallacy: aspersions are cast on the legitimacy of the eschatological position because it happens to share some features in common with the Jehovah’s Witnesses. Such an eschatological prospect is not inherently delegitimated because Jehovah’s Witnesses believe in something similar; nor would it gain any legitimacy if Jehovah’s Witnesses had never happened to believe anything similar whatsoever.

Unfortunately, there are other times in which brethren will commit the guilt by association fallacy even though the person, doctrine, or practice has very little, if any, actual connection or relationship with the disfavored person or group. An example of this involves the condemnation of “Neo-Calvinism” in churches of Christ. If one were to go online and search for “Neo-Calvinism,” one would discover Neo-Calvinism as a movement within the Dutch Reformed world associated with Abraham Kuyper, who desired to more forcefully apply Calvinist theological logic in the realm of the everyday in the early twentieth century. While there are likely some Neo-Calvinist ideas which have been filtered through various later Reformed theologians which may have affected some members of churches of Christ, such is not at all what is imagined by “Neo-Calvinism” in churches of Christ. Instead, “Neo-Calvinism” was the term conjured up by some brethren in a previous generation and used against some Christians who proved more ecumenical in spirit and, it was claimed, who desired to emphasize grace to the detriment of obedience. Other arguments which have been “recycled” among brethren for generations about the continuous cleansing of Christians and the propensity to sin were also added into this mix. Since many brethren associate any insistence on grace with which they prove uncomfortable with the tenets of Calvinism, it seemed natural to them to consider such things “Neo-Calvinism,” even though, by common confession, no one involved affirmed Reformed confessions, the TULIP system of doctrine, or anything regarding what everyone else understood as “Neo-Calvinism.”

This last example does well to demonstrate what goes wrong when Christians fall prey to the guilt by association fallacy. We now see arguments casting aspersions on the creation and use of the term “Neo-Calvinism,” and then the attempts to excuse or rationalize the characterization; meanwhile, actual doctrines and/or practices are only being discussed as to whether they legitimate the paradigm or not. In the end, even if one could legitimate the use of “Neo-Calvinism” in churches of Christ, that association alone does not make any person, doctrine, or practice inherently justified or condemned. What drove the impulse to create such a characterization, even though said characterization already existed in a very different form? Why was there perceived to be such a need to cast such aspersions on what certain brethren were teaching and/or doing, attempting to create a category and a system? The goal, as with all forms of guilt by association, was to demonize those with whom they disagreed, and poison the well of discourse about a set of subjects. The term continues to be used to the same end with the attempted same effect: now whenever a preacher would attempt to place the emphasis upon grace which arguably can be perceived from the Apostle Paul himself, he is liable to be accused of “Neo-Calvinism” as opposed to having anyone actually argue whether that emphasis is justified or condemned on its merits. Ironically, the accusation ends up saying more about the person who would level it than the one against whom it is leveled.

We have not done ourselves any favors by constantly appealing to the “denominational” bogeyman. Such is not a denial of how many religious groups professing Christianity have taught and practiced all kinds of things regarding which the Scriptures say nothing or which work against what God has made known in Christ through the Spirit. But no teaching or practice is inherently made wrong because they are believed and/or practiced within Christian denominations; in fact, almost every doctrine or practice we uphold and affirm as apostolic and worthy of emulation is also upheld and affirmed by some Christian denomination. Thus, calling something “denominational” does not tell you much about it: we could argue baptism for the remission of sins is “denominational” because Roman Catholics affirm it, or singing without the use of instruments in music is “denominational” because the Eastern Orthodox have practiced that way for thousands of years.

Instead, by maintaining the “denominational” bogeyman, we have often thereby fallen into error because we wanted to stand as far as possible away from its opposing error. I have personally witnessed Christians who have proven uncomfortable with Jesus’ humanity because to them it seemed like “something the Jehovah’s Witnesses would believe.” Granted, such was probably a garbled concern based on how Jehovah’s Witnesses hold to an Arian Christology in which Jesus is “a” son of god but not God the Son. Yet Scripture powerfully affirms Jesus remains fully human as well as fully divine, and that remains true whatever Jehovah’s Witnesses happen to believe (cf. 1 Timothy 2:5, Hebrews 2:14-18, etc.). Likewise, while one might attempt to cast aspersions on a “restored” earth/”new heavens and new earth” eschatological perspective by associating it with the Jehovah’s Witnesses, the generally opposing view, the purely “heaven bound” eschatological perspective could be associated with the Gnostics and their contempt for all things material, explicitly condemned by Paul and John (1 Timothy 6:20-21, 2 John 1:6-11).

Since nothing is inherently condemned because a given person or denomination believes in and/or practices it, Christians do well to resist such tempting but ultimately fallacious arguments. Beliefs and practices should be considered and affirmed or denied on the basis of whether they prove consistent or inconsistent with what God has made known in Christ through the Spirit. We will never come to the truth of God in Christ simply by reacting against what a given religious organization affirms or denies about a given matter; in most matters of the faith error remains present on both extremes, and truth quite often will be found upheld in the tension and balance among what might seem to be contradictory and thus paradoxical premises. There is no virtue in going full Augustinian Calvinist, for instance; but full Pelagianism is no better. In the end, there might be a given kind of error in front of you, but there also is an error behind you of which you may not be as aware, or find as repellent; and many have become deceived thereby. Sadly, we too often end up arguing in attempts to justify our characterizations and accusations of guilt by association rather than addressing the actual, substantive issues regarding which there might be disagreement. Furthermore, nuance regarding matters of emphasis are often drowned out because a self-appointed watchman decided any deviation from what he has come to believe is the norm must automatically be a capitulation to some denominational doctrine.

Who among us has the right or standing to declare their understanding of what God has made known in Christ through the Spirit should be the arbiter of what is right and true, and any possible deviation in any direction must therefore be apostasy unto some form of denominationalism? But how is that not the rotten fruit of our reliance on accusations of guilt by association to set forth what we believe to be wrong from what we believe to be right?

As opposed to saying something is wrong because this or that person or denomination believed in it or practiced it, we do better to demonstrate from what God has made known in Christ through the Spirit what proves difficult or challenging with a given belief or practice. We do better at leaving the ultimate judgment to the One whom God has appointed for that purpose, the Lord Jesus Christ, lest we be found judges rather than doers, and perhaps even condemned. May we prove humble servants of the Lord, not arrogant presumptuous accusers of God’s people, and find salvation in Jesus!

Ethan R. Longhenry