By Paul Weiser
In his much-maligned book "The Enemy at Home," Dinesh D'Souza makes, in passing, the exceedingly important point that hypocrisy doesn't signify. In longer form, the rightness of a moral principle is unaffected by whether its proclaimer lives up to it. Though this truth is easily demonstrated, its consequences are far-reaching... even devastating.
Take, for example, Preacher Paul who says no one should lie, steal, kill or fornicate. It turns out that Paul is a philanderer, deacons Peter and Thomas steal from the collection plate, and Pete also killed a traveler and hid the body. All lied about it (the other deacon, James, led a blameless life though many thought him a prig). Does this story invalidate Paul's teaching (and James' life)? Is the congregation free to rob, murder, sleep around and perjure themselves?
Obviously not: the deacons' transgressions are evil regardless of trust bestowed on them, and their insincere acceptance of Paul's teachings. Furthermore, Paul's preaching against fornication, though insincere, does not make fornication good or even acceptable.
Truth is truth just as the good is the good. Sincerity is not accuracy: a sincere proclaimer of Ptolemaic cosmology does not make the sun go around the earth, nor does insincere proclamation of Copernican cosmology. If murder is bad, it's bad... even if the woman who says so is herself a poisoner.
The point is that hypocrisy is a valid criticism of individuals, not the principles they avow and violate. Those who claim (or believe) otherwise are not only mistaken. In most cases, they start with attacking the principal (which, in one way or another, bites them), seek a hypocritical proclaimer of that principal, and then proclaim that his (irrelevant) hypocrisy invalidates the principal they hate. Remember: hypocrisy bites the hypocrite... no one and nothing else.
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