When Exaggerations & Fables Can Be Righteous In Intent
Word-of-the-Day: ’(1) Joab son of Zeruiah knew that the king’s heart longed for Absalom. (2) So, Joab sent someone to Tekoa and had a wise woman brought from there. He said to her, “Pretend you are in mourning. Dress in mourning clothes, and don’t use any cosmetic lotions. Act like a woman who has spent many days grieving for the dead. (3) Then go to the king and speak these words to him.” And Joab put the words in her mouth.’ (2 Samuel 14:1-3)
Many people have made President Trump’s recent statements regarding the bombing of Iran ‘back to the Stone Age’ and ‘ending Iran’s civilization’ as being grossing wrong and holding these comments as evidence of mental instability. In the Western world’s mindset, we don’t normally take such comments as being civil or proper, more so as the politically correct speech of wokeness and DEI have left its marks on secular society.
But, as one person mentioned in an interview recently regarding President Trump, one must take Trump seriously, but not literally. What he said was directed to Iran and its Middle Eastern neighbors, not at the nations of the West. While the vulgar cursing could and should have been curtailed, the comments made were at the level of communications the Iranians themselves (and Middle Eastern leaders in general) engage in; a form of ‘trash talking’ in exaggerated threats to gain an advantage over adversaries in terms of a warning.
They were comments the Iranians could understand, not to be taken literally but in serious context, that while they were not going to be made extinct, they would be brought to a state of devastation that would cause great suffering among the people and the removal of the regime from power as its price of failing to heed the warning.
Exaggerations to make points in discussion are nothing new and are not limited to Middle Eastern conversations. We often use exaggerations to describe things we experience; ‘he hit that home run a mile away!’, or ‘he was going a hundred miles an hour on that scooter!’, for a couple of examples. The bubba hitting the home run likely hit it 400 feet, and the scooter may have been speeding at 35 miles per hour, but we exaggerate to convey what we felt when we saw or experienced these events.
When we exaggerate, we are telling the truth through using untruthful descriptions. Sometimes we engage in telling tales, or stories, that did not happen using believable descriptions of fictional events to make an impression upon those listening to us. When our neighborhood was empty and void of houses ‘back in the day’, I would tell my son (and later my daughter), when they were starting to go out and play on their own that there were ‘pygmies’ in the woods who liked to hunt children (and eat them) who wandered out of their yards.
You could tell my kids there were rattlesnakes, scorpions, bobcats, and wild boar (all truthfully living in our woods), and thus to stay in the yard, but when it got too quiet, I’d find our six-year-old son in our adjoining lots walking through the palmettos. After telling him about the pygmies, he didn’t go exploring again until he was a bit older and realized there really weren’t pygmies living in Florida and knew to carefully watch where he was stepping when in the empty lots around our home, and shake a stick when approaching palmetto bushes to get any snakes to move out (or at least make themselves known).
Aesop’s fables were precautionary tales like the pygmies. These were stories that while not true, were told to impress upon young minds to be cautious and watchful and truthful in intent. Jesus himself used parables or allegories for both his followers and detractors (namely the Pharisees) to understand His truths and ways. They were fictional in their telling but truthful in their meaning.
We find example where fictional stories and exaggerations are told to convey a truthful message. 2 Samuel 14 tells of the ruse Joab set up to convey a message to King David to bring about the return of Absalom from banishment for the killing of his brother Amnon, due to Amnon’s rape of his sister Tamar. The banishment of Absalom caused great anguish with David, and Joab decided to set up a living ‘fable’ to bring about a reconciliation.
Joab hires a woman from Tekoa to act as a mother mourning, with a surviving son that had killed her other son. Joab sends the ‘actress’ to David, to petition him to use his power as Israel’s king to protect the living son and provide him amnesty. David proclaims the edict to protect the son, and the Tekoa woman tells David of her ruse, to make him understand that he needed to forgive Absalom and return him to the family. This ‘fable’ provided David the means to have Absalom repatriated, and eventually (partially) reconciling with Absalom two years later. Absalom himself used a ruse to gain an audience with Joab (messaging Joab his fields were ablaze, forcing Joab come to inspect his fields, so Absalom could meet Joab, and force Joab to talk with him).
We are not to lie, and especially to lie in malicious and destructive intent. It is better to tell the complete Truth, without exaggeration and without having to make up a fictional account to tell the Truth. It is certainly wrong to bear false witness, a false story that bears a falsehood on someone or something with the intent for them to bear a false accusation of wrongdoing. It is equivalent to murdering someone physically, a murder of their character and reputation.
It is, however, sometimes better to tell a fable or use a parable, or exaggerate an event, to gain a good outcome, convincing someone to act and behave righteously and to proceed in caution. It should be a last resort, however. Though I believe trash talking is not preferred, or avoid telling children to beware of roaming tribes of pygmies, they often have their place to be used as a warning and can be Righteous if the intent is to provoke Righteous actions. We have a ceasefire in the Middle East because of a ‘trash-talking’ exaggeration was taken as the warning it was.
