Welcome back to the Fourth Way podcast. Today, I am planning on just putting out a short little episode, but an important one because I'm gonna do something that I I really should have done a long time ago. We are going to delve into the meaning of The Fourth Way. Now, I know that I spent a little bit of time explaining what The Fourth Way meant in season one episode one, But it was like thirty seconds maybe that I spent on that and it it I didn't really elaborate very much at all. And I think it's it's really important for you to understand where we get this name because it really will provide a lot of insight into kind of what our goal is and the topics we cover and the underlying philosophy behind some things.

So without further ado, let's go ahead and jump in. In the nonviolent community, many often refer to nonviolence as the third way. However, when I started this podcast, I wasn't quite familiar with that yet, and someone in my group recommended the fourth way and I thought that sounded really cool. They said, So, you know, you've got you've got kind of three options that you have in response to non violence. First, you can fight.

Second, you can flee which is, you know, the fight or flight response. The third thing that you can do is you can freeze in fear. And then the fourth way would be non violence. Now, lot of people in the nonviolent community have gone with third way, as I've come to find out, and so they're, you know, they're focused on fight and flight and they split the difference and say, nonviolence is a third way, aren't only two options on the table, that's a false dichotomy. Sort of like a if you're familiar with Euthyphro's Dilemma, it's basically that just in the nonviolent community.

We don't have to take this false dichotomy, we can actually provide a third solution which most people don't recognize as being on the table. But anyway, I went with the fourth way, I thought it was a really good idea, and so I just kind of went with it because I didn't have any any better ideas for what was out there. Now, unfortunately, and I should have known better, but I did not do a great job researching the fourth way to see if there are any other uses for this this term. And I did find out that there were or there there's one in particular and it focuses on Eastern thought. It's kind of, I don't know if it's Buddhist or Hindu or it's got some Eastern ideology there about kind of the the way that you get in touch with yourself and the world and sort of asceticism and all that stuff.

And that's it was doubly unfortunate, not only in that it was it was used for another thing, but that the thing for which it was used is is something that I really want to distance myself from. Because a lot of people when they hear about non violence, you know, sometimes you either you have one of two ideas. Either you think it's those kind of like C. S. Lewis when he railed against liberal pacifism.

You kind of think these idealistic liberal people or you think of Eastern mysticism or you think of Gandhi, and you think those kind of idealistic people who are one with nature and there is no evil and that kind of thing. And when you think of like peace symbols and hippies and their their infatuation with Eastern mysticism, nonviolence a lot of times in people's minds has this close association with Eastern mysticism or Eastern thought. And so what I found out is that the fourth way does have this this alternative meaning, and that was really unfortunate. But it is what it is at this point, of course. But at the same time, you know, if I'm gonna be optimistic, I think that it might be a good thing because if you do have people who are coming from Eastern thoughts and they get some exposure to this podcast, maybe they will kind of hear the words of Jesus which will resonate with them and maybe that will cause them to give Christianity a look.

So that would be good. And at the same time, just because somebody else is using the idea of the fourth way doesn't mean that the fourth way isn't isn't a good idea because I really do like like the distinction here fight, flight, freeze and then you've got the third way which is ultimately self sacrifice, which portrays itself in non violence because self sacrifice means I'm willing to lay down my life even for my enemy. So I like it and I kept it and I'm still gonna go with it. So in the the fourth way, the four ways mentioned are all ways that we handle conflict, right? You can fight and do violence, you can flee and run away, you can freeze and do nothing, or you can do this fourth thing fourth thing.

Now, I didn't know how to describe that fourth way in one word when we first started out. Non violence, it kind of was a filler, but non violence isn't really descriptive. That's it's kind of a passive sort of thing. It's not it's not passive in the sense that you're not doing anything, it's more that you are responding to something. So, I don't just go out and do non violence, rather an event happens and I choose to be non violent through that event.

So it's not super descriptive. But taking a look at non violence and thinking about what it was trying to counter, it was really trying to counter ways that we deal with harm or aggression or violence, right? So we can do harm, which would be a violent response. We can avoid harm, we can ignore harm. And this fourth way had something to do with embracing self harm for the good of others.

So it wasn't masochistic, it's not harming yourself, but it's embracing the harm and it's kind of eating eating the harm, taking it upon yourself. And that that is why if you listen to season one, I go back to Philippians two all the time, which which talks so much about this this idea of kenosis or self emptying. Just like Jesus, are is our example, emptied Himself and sacrificed His status and His life, His comfort for us. In Philippians two, as well as through the rest of the Bible, we see that we do this, we embrace self sacrifice for the sake of others and for the sake of the Kingdom of God. We can be obedient unto death and we can be self sacrificial because Jesus was that way for us.

He didn't grasp at power, He submitted to God. And that is the fourth way, this idea of self sacrifice. So I actually like having the fourth way because the third way fails to avoid a common misconception, I think. You know, we usually think fight or flight, and if we offer a third way, people immediately think freeze or passivity, this this doing nothing. So in the end, I really do like the fourth way because it draws out one of the misunderstandings of non violence with this idea that non violence is passive.

And the fourth way, this notion of self sacrifice, I think gives us something that is active, it's more of this active thought, and it helps to see what is really going on when we talk about non violence. Whereas fear tends to be the driver of the other responses, but not always, it's absolutely impossible for fear to be the driver of self sacrifice. Now, fear can be present with sacrifice, of course, of course it can, but it can't be the driving force of self sacrifice. You know, someone can harm another out of fear, you can run away in fear, and you can freeze in fear, but one can't really embrace and take on suffering, pain, and loss as a result of being driven by fear. And driven by fear I think is an important distinction here because will somebody who is sacrificing of themselves be fearful?

Sure, and we'll get into that in just a second. But you can't be driven by fear and sacrifice yourself. So sacrifice is really a great summary of the best valid option for Christians in regard to injustice. Now, again, I am not at all saying that to flee is never the right thing to do, or that to fight, at least if we're talking about, you know, aggressing animals and such, that that fight is never the right response. My emphasis here is that fear is not to be the driving force of our actions.

And when faced with injustice and evil, the ultimate solution is to count our lives as lost for the sake of Christ. When we get into, not this upcoming season, but the one after, it will be a season on non violent action. So we'll get into some specific non violent movements and scenarios and those sorts of things. And one of the first episodes in that season is going to be about the role of fear in violence and and how that plays a role. And so we are gonna have some episodes where we talk about this idea of fear being a driving motivation, and I know it's gonna be kind of contentious to some people, but now I'm gonna argue that fear a lot of times, even in actions that we deem heroic, like let's say in the military, fear is not only the driving force behind why we go to some of the places that we do, right?

Think terrorism here. Like, we're scared that somebody's gonna attack us, so for protection, right? But out of fear, we go and we're willing to sacrifice hundreds of thousands of civilians and spend tons of money because we're fearful. But even on the ground, when you talk about soldiers, we can get into fear as being a driving motivation, which doesn't mean that people don't have bravery, it's just fear is often a driver of even aggressive actions. Just because you're confrontational does not mean that you are not fearful.

So I don't wanna get too deep into that right now, but we will talk about that a little bit later if you're kind of upset that I'm I'm not nuancing things here. Okay, so finally, let's talk a little bit about the imagery. Someone from my community volunteered to make an image for the podcast and I think it worked out wonderfully. I have linked her Instagram in all of the episodes, so if you would like to see that, you can. And what I really like about this is that I wanted to go with a lot of Biblical images and I think she incorporated those really well.

It's very clean and crisp and it incorporates a lot of Biblical images. At the same time, I wanted to keep it light on the images that weren't as overtly Biblical. I wanted a clear emphasis of the podcast to be that I'm not just talking about non violence, I'm not talking about the secular version, and I'm not talking about the Eastern version, which is partly why I wanted to avoid I know there's a peace symbol in there, but I avoided tried to avoid some of the other things and just loading on top these things that might be associated with secularism or Eastern mysticism. So in our podcast, the cross is really the big aspect of what we're doing here. Now we can also see a dove and a flower, all of which are pretty self explanatory in terms of their associations with non violence.

And the other major component is the lion and the lamb. Now I understand, thanks to a friend's correction a few years ago, that the Bible talks about the wolf and the lamb lying down together. However, most people think of a lion and a lamb, that's just a common misconception. It kinda conveys the same idea, right, because I'm sure lions would eat lambs too, so now what does it matter if you replace the lion and the wolf? And because it does convey the same thing and I really do like the lion and the lamb because I think it it kind of imports another meaning that I want to put in there, which is that Jesus is the Lion of Judah and the Lamb who was slain.

We see Jesus as the Lion and the Lamb in Revelation and I really like this dual depiction of Him as a conqueror, but that He conquers through self sacrifice. So if you're kind of one of those nitpicky people that says, well, it's not really the Lion and the Lamb, it's the Wolf and the Lamb, know that there is thought put into this and the lion and the lamb is, I think, a good take on multiple themes of the Bible even if it doesn't copy that one verse exactly, wolf and the lamb. So I like it, you might not, that's okay, it's your prerogative. Alright, so there it is. That is the fourth way.

And I hope that going into that helps you to understand this podcast a little bit better, that when you see the imagery, you will understand a little bit more what that that there has been a lot of thought put into the the imagery and that imagery is going to be informative, it's gonna help inform what you hear in the podcast. Now what you'll notice if you listen to this podcast on iTunes or maybe some other other formats, the image is now changed. So I've started to label the four ways in the corner of the image. And that kind of marks two things. First of all, that marks from this episode on, all podcasts will have their image changed so that it will be easier access for people who don't listen to this particular episode.

They'll be able to identify what the four ways are, but it's also marking something new. This is my first podcast on some new equipment. Now, I was super low tech before I had like a headset mic, and I was talking to somebody who knows a bit about sound and he was saying, yeah, you're clipping a lot and, you know, your your mids are really high because headsets try to pick up the voice range and it it just doesn't sound as good. So I didn't know what clipping meant and and all that stuff, but he recommended that I invest in some equipment. Now, my budget, I have zero money coming in to support this, and this is, at the moment, a a hobby, and we're not we don't have a lot of money, and I don't know that, you know, my my lack of sound knowledge really warrants spending a ton.

But for like a hundred and $50, I have this so at $200, I have this setup that I got. Still using pillows and and all kinds of things, it's still very, very low key, but I'm hopeful that the vocals sound better here, that there's not distortion. I'm hoping that that small investment was able to make a bit of a difference and make me easier to listen to, at least in terms of my tonal qualities. I don't know, we'll see. But from this point on, I am recording with newer equipment.

Now, I will say that in this upcoming season, on the means and the ends, where we go into the politics of Jesus, I've already recorded like half of the season. So there will be some of these episodes, I think like five maybe, some of the episodes are going to be still with that old quality, and others will have this quality. So if you hear a difference, know that once you're through this season, the quality should be permanently different. So, anyway, well, that's all for now. So peace, and because I'm a pacifist, when I say it, I mean it.