Honor: The Last Word

Honor. The word is mentioned 147 times in the Bible. The Medal of Honor is the highest U.S. military award for valor. The last word of the last sentence of the Declaration of  Independence says, “…we mutually pledge to each other our Lives, our Fortunes, and our sacred Honor.”

This word is not some esoteric and theoretical exercise in hyperbole, but a life-changing and sometimes life-compromising obligation, as well as a sacred expectation.

History tells us that of the 56 signers of that oath, more than half died fighting, or lost their fortunes, or were captured and tortured and lost their families. Others died bankrupt, while some fled their homes and families in exile, having their homesteads, farms, fields and lands laid to waste. To the founders, their honor was real, tangible, brought to bear by their actions, to the point of being more valuable and more important than their very lives.

In the history of the United States, Medal of Honor recipients make up less than one-one hundredth of one-percent of the entirety of the ranks of the armed forces. More than 40  million have served in our military, and only 3,517 have earned that medal. Honor,  especially when combined with valor, is indeed rare.

The Bible instructs us to “Honor thy mother and thy father,” “Let marriage be held in honor among all,” “Honor the Lord with your wealth and with the first fruits of all your produce,” and finally, “Whoever pursues righteousness and kindness will find life,  righteousness, and honor.” Let us not forget, in the Declaration it was their “sacred  honor” that they willingly embraced. and which related them directly to God.

What about our honor? What about honor in today’s world?

As recently as 200 years ago, honor was so important to men that duels were fought  defending it. A sitting vice-president, Aaron Burr, shot and killed Alexander Hamilton in a duel after the latter had assailed the former’s character. Modern-day dueling would likely make for a more restrained and polite society when “talking smack” might well get you killed.

Socrates tells us, “The greatest way to live with honor in this world is to be what we  pretend to be” — an ancient version of fake-it-till-you-make-it, as well as an uncomfortable revealed truth for many.

The fact is honor exists only in the make-believe world of most people. The rarity of the  trait makes those who possess it exceptional. Somewhere along the line, we have taken  what was in the first instance rare, and rendered it into near extinction today.

And so it is that amongst the ranks of the “honorable” we should be selecting and electing  our political leaders. We should expect no less from today’s politicians than we did from  our founders, but how does one test for and measure honor?

Ironically, an ally of our deceased-duelist, penned the following in Federalist 51, “If men were angels, no government would be necessary. If angels were to govern men, neither external nor internal controls on government would be necessary.” James Madison was obviously lamenting the shortage of honorable men and because of that, he helped create a political philosophy and governing blueprint that recognized the issue of men’s propensity towards self-dealing with a series of checks-and-balances to temper against corruption.

Thomas Jefferson wrote those eternal words in the Declaration, not accidentally ending  with honor, and additionally said, “Honor and duty are superior to rights and self-interest.” And finally:

A wise and frugal Government, which shall restrain  men from injuring one another, which shall leave them otherwise free to regulate their own pursuits of industry and improvement, and shall not take from the mouth of labor the bread it has earned.

Where we find ourselves today seems like a bridge-so-far when compared with those  great men of our founding.

Isaac Asimov warned of the following:

There is a cult of ignorance in the United States, and there has always been. The strain of anti-intellectualism has been a constant thread winding its way through our  political and cultural life; nurtured by the false notion that democracy means that my  ignorance is just as good as your knowledge.

By fostering and nurturing our relationship with God and re-asserting our sacred beliefs and eternal expectations, we can regain our collective honor. If we fail, we cannot prevail in that exquisite model of perfection those wise and exceptional men designed and created for us some 250-years ago. “American exceptionalism,” a concept so often misunderstood, is inextricably linked with our “sacred honor” and with that, undeniably  the worship of and glory to God Almighty. It will be up to the honorable amongst us to  ensure the continued success of this great nation or if not, we then shall indeed deserve to  perish. In the truest sense of a humble prayer, I ask for God to guide us in our quest for  honor.

Bob Kingsley is a Binghamton-based writer who also blogs at bobkingsley.com.