Irrational Fears of “The Other” Contradict Biblical Values
Lodged deep within our human psyches is a gut level instinct to distrust or fear “the other” (stranger, foreigner, or member of a different social group. Some researchers link this back to our hunter/gatherer days when recognizing those who belonged to your tribe (people who looked like you) and those who didn’t (people who didn’t look like you) was an important matter of survival. While distrust of the other may be understandable in a circumstance of warring tribes, how does this instinct translate to our modern society that is full of diverse (and non-enemy) people who live and work in close proximity? Though our social situation has changed, our biology (in this regard) has not. We still have a natural suspicion for those (even within our American neighborhoods) that we consider “not one of us”. Politicians often tap into this instinct with a tactic called fear mongering. In the immigration conversation, for example, some in the political sphere have painted entire swaths of people with such broad sweeping labels like “criminal”, “rapists”, “drug lords”, “terrorists”, or just plain “illegals”. Because we naturally distrust those we consider “the other”, this stokes the smoldering embers of our already present concerns into mighty flames of fear. The tragedy in this is that by tapping into our fear instinct, we will often accept woefully inaccurate labels about groups of people. Point, in fact, this inflammatory rhetoric might simply represent what we secretly believed about “them” in the first place.
The immigration conversation where our stoked fears generate statistically irrational thinking. Maybe we are black Americans driving in a predominately white and rural township and fear that “all white people” in that location are mean-spirited racists that are waiting to string us up from a tree if we stop to use the bathroom. Maybe we are white Americans entering a predominately black environment that we are not used to, and fear that “all black people” in that area there are simply waiting to rob us blind if we stop at the sketchy looking gas station. Perhaps the Indian families that are making moving into our previously homogeneous neighborhoods warrant our special attention or we think that airport security should do extra checks on the adult males wearing kaffiyehs (Arab headdress) “just to be safe”.
Think about the last time you saw a guy walking alone in the rain. Did you consider offering him a ride? If so, was that consideration immediately bombarded with thoughts of why it would be a bad idea? “What if they’re dangerous?” “What if they will get in my car and hold me at gunpoint?” “What if they try to kidnap me?” When these thoughts enter our minds, we determine that the risk of getting taken advantage of outweighs that of helping, so we just keep driving.
Though it is statically unlikely that the random guy you offer a ride will be a psychopathic killer, or that the black guy with locks is a dangerous criminal or that all white people are relics of a Jim Crow south, once fear grips us, our rational minds run for the hills. I’m not saying that the world is a completely safe place in which we completely let down our guard. I’m simply proposing that our innate fear of the other generates personal bias towards our “in group” and against the “out group”. This is a bias, confirmed in research, such as the study that showed Manchester United soccer fans were four times as likely to help an unknown victim simply because the victim wore a Manchester United jersey vs a victim wearing a Liverpool jersey or a regular shirt.[1]
This begs the question of who we consider our “in group” and who is our “out group”? Do we identify these categories based on religion? Ethnicity/race? Social class? Political party? Profession? This is an important analysis, since (as research shows) we are prone to give preferential treatment to our own and non-preferential treatment to those we consider not our own. This is natural. But just because something is “natural” or “innate” does not mean it should be obeyed. As followers of Jesus Christ, we are called to something higher. We are told to “walk according to the Spirit” (Jesus’ way of operating) so we don’t operate and give in to the ways of “the flesh” (our naturally flawed ways of operating) [2]. What I am suggesting here is that giving in to these fears of “the other” is not only irrational, but contrary to the ethic displayed by Christ.
1 John 4:18 gives us this wisdom: “There is no fear in love, but perfect love casts out fear, because fear involves torment. But he who fears has not been made perfect in love” (NKJV). We can understand this verse in its reverse—where there is no love, fear is present. We will return to this verse later, but for now, understand that when we fail to lovingly treat others as one of our own, we resort to a fear approach. When we don’t love, we don’t trust. And we fear the things that we do not trust. Fear by itself, though, is not the problem. The truth is that excessive/irrational fear of the “other” can cause a host of other problems. Below are six ways that fear does this, which is really a list of six ways that irrational fear blocks us from loving our neighbor. After this analysis, we will conclude with the biblical response.
Six Problems Caused by Irrational Fear of the Other
1) Irrational fear makes us prone to accept blanket stereotypes
This brings me back to the problem of generalized rhetoric. Consider the language surrounding the “migrant caravans” (large groups of people fleeing their country to pursue access to the U.S. via the southern border). Depending on what politician/news source you followed, the rhetoric comprised labeling all the members as criminals and drug lords who only access to the U.S. so that they could continue their criminal escapades. This is a blanket stereotype because even if there are some among the group that are dangerous criminals and want to sell drugs, it is very unlikely this is the case for the entire group. Yet, these nuances don’t matter when fear is involved. Everyone who looks like a member of that group is held under scrutiny.
2) Irrational fear causes us to deceive ourselves to justify our own prejudice
Not only do we accept these harmful stereotypes, but we do what it takes to convince ourselves that our acceptance of such is rational. We do things like pay attention to news stories about Islamic extremists but don’t consider the far greater number of Muslims who do not follow the extremist path. When prejudicial treatment of Muslims in our country happens, then we don’t feel the moral outrage because that treatment has been rationalized (or at the very least, we know it happens but feel no remorse looking the other way). The smaller number of stories that fit our bias have effectively become the lens through which we view the entire population. In the study of Scripture, some theologians call this effect “letting the tail wag the dog”. We will take one or two passages that appear to suggest a particular truth—such as the very few passages that (on the surface) suggest that women cannot lead in ministry in the same capacity as men. We then use this conclusion to interpret the rest of Scripture. The flaw in this is that it ignores the far greater number passages that count men and women as equally valued, equal in status, equal in giftings, and the ones that specifically recognize women leaders who served in the early New Testament church.[3] In the same way that we cannot let the minor interpret that major in biblical studies, we cannot let the minor interpret the major when it comes to our views of people.
3) Irrational fear causes us to artificially create enemies
Remember earlier when I mentioned how fear is a gut response that is often connected to our sense of survival? Time and time again, we see the same pattern in society where people appear united and together—until tragedy strikes. Then we resort back to fear based tribal divisions where we blame anyone one that isn’t “us”. Consider the aftermath of 9/11. Americans became afraid. As a result, Arab Americans, some of whom were in this country their entire lives were now faced with fresh discrimination as if they were no longer considered “true Americans”. Our Arab coworkers and business owners were now considered “one of them”. When our back is against the wall, resources become scarce or we start to feel that our comfortable way of living is threatened, fear causes us to systematically make our “in group” smaller. We must protect our own and, in the process, we blame others and tell them they are no longer a part of our group.
4) Irrational fear can lead to violence
This comes as a progression from creating enemies. History shows us that not only will the out-group face discrimination, but they may also face violence. Consider the global Covid-19 pandemic. I cringed when politicians called the pandemic the “Chinese Virus”. Whether these communicators were being intentionally racist is beside the point. This style of communication inadvertently and unreasonably placed blame on the entire Chinese population for the pandemic—is it therefore any surprise that Anti-Asian hate crimes increased by 77% from 2019 to 2020 in our environment of scarcity and uncertainty?[4] Asian citizens, in the eyes of some, became treated as the out group—even after living in America for their entire lives. While some may label it “mere coincidence”, it would be foolish of us to act like the rise in discrimination, crimes, and even violence against Asian citizens in our country over the last couple of years as unrelated to being blamed for the pandemic.
5) Irrational fear held by those in power will yield political disparities for the out-group
This point is really a common sense one. Irrational fear causes us to be biased. As we saw earlier, we are less likely to help a non-team member. So, what happens when the people who have these irrational fears of foreigners, minorities, or others, sit in a seat of power? Though they are supposed to represent the will of the people, the will of the out-group won’t be represented, and policies get passed that do nothing to help hurting communities of people in need simply because they have been designated as “not a true member of the team”.
6) Irrational fear will torment us
One phrase of the verse in 1 John shows that when love is absent and fear is all that remains, then fear is a tormentor. In our American society where we pride our own individualism, sometimes we also pride ourselves in the fact that we don’t easily trust others. But lack of trust is not a badge of honor—it is a sickness. Left unattended, the sting of our own insulation from everyone around us will devour us from the inside and cause us to lose touch with reality. The more extreme forms of this manifest themselves in consistent paranoia. It is not only that I do not trust others; it is that I cannot trust them because everyone is out to get me. This state of being only drives us further and further into an isolation by which we systematically cut off everyone around us until we are the only ones who remain. At that point, some of us turn the blade on our own necks and may even stop trusting ourselves. A life where your in-group is continuously cut down so that you are the only one that remains is no life at all—it is a slow form of death.
The Biblical Response
While we cannot choose what fear does to us (since it is an instinctual gut level bodily response), we can choose how to respond. So, how should we? Now we turn our attention to the Scriptures to see what they have to say about our relationship with the outsider. From our analysis, I will propose four ways in which God calls Christians to navigate this issue that differ from the fearful ways we’ve previously discussed.
1) Give special attention to the outsider
Deuteronomy 24:14-15 says, “you shall not oppress a hired worker who is poor and needy, whether he is one of your brothers or one of the sojourners (foreigners) who are in your land within your towns. You shall give him his wages… lest he cry against you to the Lord and you be guilty of sin.”
Before we write this passage off because it’s in the Old Testament, understand that this theme is repeated throughout the entire Old & New Testaments. This leads me to conclude that it was not just a specific command given only to the Israelites at that specific time in history, but its repetition implies a universal applicable principle, in this case, it is that we should pay special attention to the outsider among us. God’s heart, revealed here, shows that when we fail to consider the cause of the foreigners/outsiders living among us, we are in error. I don’t want to move from this point too quickly, since some high-profile Americans who claim to follow Christ have communicated very derogatory, racist, and harsh judgements about others who do not come from America. The Bible is clear that those attitudes fly in the face of biblical Christianity.
2) Remember that “in Christ” we all share a common identity
Galatians 3:28 says that in Christ “there is neither Jew nor Greek, there is nether slave nor free, there is no male and female for you are all one in Christ Jesus”.
The point of this text is not to literally ignore social, ethnic, and gendered distinctions between others, but the point is to get us to accept that over and above our ethnicity, social status, and even gender, Christians all belong to the same family and share that identity in common.
3) Widen the parameters of your in-group
Matthew 12:49-50 says, “And stretching out his (Jesus) hand toward his disciples, he said, “here are my mother and my brothers! For whoever does the will of my Father in heaven is my brother and sister and mother.”
While Jesus is teaching, his earthly mother and brothers show up to speak to Him. While other passages show Jesus having high regard for His earthly family, He seems to capitalize on this opportunity as a teaching moment. In an ancient society where family bonds were everything, Jesus does the radical thing of extending those bonds to a new in group—instead of being characterized by blood, Jesus’ family is characterized by like obedience to His message.
What this shows (as reflected in the Manchester United study) is that it is possible for us to share an in-group identity over something bigger than race, ethnicity, religion, economic status, etc. If we are to claim the title of Christian, the implication is clear—we are to first and foremost relate to each other as members of the family of God before we relate to each other along any other lines. We must not ignore the other lines (that would be an egregious error), but we have a shared identity in Christ that should supersede all else. If we do this, then we can literally have an in-group comprising diverse races, ethnicities, economic status, and gender—much like the early church.
4) Choose to love others as yourself
Mark 12:31 says, “you shall love your neighbor as yourself.”
This and the instruction given in 1 John 4:18 (cited above) give a very practical solution to fear—love. It is hard to fear someone when we are walking a mile in their shoes and treating them how we want to be treated. But this involves choice. While we can’t choose how we feel and we can’t choose which people or groups cause the spark of fear inside us, we can choose what we decide to do with this person—and the text is clear that the choice should involve loving them as our own.
To conclude, I do not reasonably suggest that we all throw caution to the wind. However, the idea that the other is always to be feared and untrusted is not a biblical value at all—it is a self-centered, cultural one. As human beings who say we follow the teachings of Jesus, we are to rise above the natural fear response to engage in a supernatural work—loving those who are unlike us.
[1] Levine, Mark, et al. “Identity and Emergency Intervention: How Social Group Membership and Inclusiveness of Group Boundaries Shape Helping Behavior.” Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, vol. 31, no. 4, Apr. 2005, pp. 443–453, doi:10.1177/0146167204271651.
[2] Galatians 5:16
[3] Example: Romans 16 list
[4] 2020 FBI Hate Crime Statistics. The United States Department of Justice, 9 Dec. 2021, https://www.justice.gov/crs/highlights/2020-hate-crimes-statistics.
