Sincerely Yours,

“Now, therefore, fear the Lord and serve Him in sincerity and truth; and put away the gods which your fathers served beyond the River and in Egypt, and serve the Lord.  Joshua 24:14  NASB

Sincerity – Are you sincere?  Ah, your answer could depend on your heritage.  The meaning of “sincere” seems to vary even in contemporary cultures.  Trilling notes:

“In French literature sincerity consists in telling the truth about oneself to oneself and to others; by truth is meant a recognition of such of one’s own traits or actions as are morally or socially discreditable and, in conventional course, concealed.  English sincerity does not demand this confrontation of what is base or shameful in oneself. The English ask of the sincere man that he communicate without deceiving or misleading.  Beyond this what is required is only a single-minded commitment to whatever dutiful enterprise he may have in hand.  Not to know oneself in the French fashion and make public what one knows, but to be oneself, in action, in deeds, what Matthew Arnold called ‘tasks’—this is what the English sincerity consists in.”[1]

This insight explains a lot.  In case you haven’t noticed, English/American sincerity doesn’t have much to do with revealing what is normally covered up.  In fact, we even laud important figures in our society who systematically conceal immoral and corruptible acts.  We laud them because we believe they only need to communicate “honestly” what is necessary for the completion of the task at hand. There is an absolute aversion to prying into the private lives of our heroes and heroines, unless, of course, those who are prying serve another “higher” purpose.  In this regard, American sincerity is thoroughly English. One’s face to the public need never reveal the darker side of life as long as the goals are accomplished.

But anyone who spends any significant amount of time in Europe encounters a different view.  Why do you suppose many Romance language cultures in Europe tend to accept the peccadillos of their leaders without undue concern?  Could it be that those cultures recognize another version of sincerity, a version which suggests that revealing real faults is a noble act?  Scandals are inevitable since we are human, but sincerity means simply admitting to them and carrying on.  Quite a bit different than trying to pretend they didn’t happen or covering them up.

In this regard, the Bible is much more French than English.  Hebrew uses the word tāmîmin this verse.  “. . . the verb’s fundamental idea of completeness”^[2]means that the biblical notion of sincerity includes revealing one’s true moral condition, not for the sake of mere publication, but in order that sin might be exposed and dealt with.  One cannot confess a hidden sin.  When the Scriptures exhort us to be complete, they have “sincere” in mind, the kind of sincerity that is able to face the dark self in hiding and bring it into the light.  We can think of it this way: tāmîm is about being complete and one can hardly be complete if there are fractures in the soul, parts of our inner being that are not integrated with our public identity.  Tāmîm is also the word for blameless, and, of course, that quality of living requires admission, confession and repentance.  No man is sincere who has something to hide.

Perhaps America needs to read a French Bible.

Topical Index:  sincerity, tāmîm, complete, Joshua 24:14

[1]Lionel Trilling, Sincerity and Authenticity, p. 58.

^[2]Payne, J. B. (1999). 2522 תָּמַם. R. L. Harris, G. L. Archer Jr., & B. K. Waltke (Eds.), Theological Wordbook of the Old Testament(electronic ed., p. 973). Chicago: Moody Press.