Don’t Be John Wilkes Booth

Last updated on: April 17, 2018 at 11:30 am by John Mark N. Reynolds

Don’t Be John Wilkes Booth 2018-04-17T11:30:35-04:00 John Mark N. Reynolds

LOGO Patheos Explore the world's faith through different perspectives on religion and spirituality! Patheos has the views of the prevalent religions and spiritualities of the world.

A large photograph depicting President Abraham Lincoln’s assassin John Wilkes Booth is displayed at a new exhibit entitled “Silent Witnesses: Artifacts of the Lincoln Assassination” Tuesday, March 17, 2015 at the Ford’s Center for Education and Leadership across the street from the historic Ford’s Theatre, in Washington. The exhibit is open to the public March 23rd to May 25th and coincides with the 150th anniversary of the Lincoln assassination on April 14th. (AP Photo/Andrew Harnik) ORG XMIT: WX507

He was handsome and committed to his cause. John Wilkes Booth also killed Abraham Lincoln.

Don’t be John Wilkes Booth.

Booth was an excellent actor, investor, and man about town. He made a massive salary and could have done anything he chose to do. He chose to shoot Abraham Lincoln.

How does a man go so wrong?

Hate.

He hated African-Americans and so hated Abraham Lincoln. He hated the North and so killed Abraham Lincoln. There was no love in his heart, just hatred.

Robert E. Lee knew that killing Lincoln would harm the South and was an evil act, but Booth knew better. We wish that a man who could kill the Great Emancipator was mad, but he was sane. Booth conspired with friends to decaptitate the entire leadership of the Washington government. The South would survive in the confusion, but the plan failed when only Booth killed his target.

We wish the best man in America was assassinated by the worst man in America, but he was not. Booth was not a bad man, he was a man hate made bad.

I have no sympathy for the cause of the Confederacy and slavery, the main reason for the rebellion. Race based slavery was a horrible moral evil, yet good men got caught up in that bad system from George Washington to Robert E. Lee. They were harmed by slavery and blasted their own reputations by owning people. Yet some men trapped in slavery fought for love of their state, had an ability to see beyond the institutions of their childhood, and worked within the laws of warfare. Men like Lee and Jackson chose poorly, but were better than most of us are in the service of this bad cause.

God help us. We must pause and make sure, since we are less consistent than they were in our lives, less brave, less talented, and less apt to have considered if we are in the wrong cause. Virtue frees, vice enslaves. Are we fighting to make ourselves and others free? If not, then whatever gifts we have are twisted by our bad cause.

Yet even then hate makes all worse.

Hate corrupted Booth making him do the vilest things without being vile. The love between men and their states, the love of one’s own country, is admirable. Booth was not motivated by love but by a hatred of tyranny (as he saw it), Lincoln, and African Americans. Hate moved him and so he killed Abraham Lincoln. This act had no glory or good and it harmed the Southern cause Booth thought he served.

Pickett could charge at Gettysburg and win glory, because he and “his boys” fought for love, even if the love was misplaced. Booth became twisted, far from the courage of the battlefield. He was a pretend soldier, fencing and sometimes cutting himself on stage in his histrionics. He hated and hatred broke him. Booth did not love the South, he hated the North.

Hate killed Booth’s moral sense, long before Booth killed Lincoln. Love in the service of a bad cause cannot utterly destroy a man, Lee remained in some ways admirable and could move on after the War. Lee chose not to be buried in uniform and dedicated the rest of his life to education. Booth hated and so could not accept defeat.

At least Booth hated in the service of a bad cause and there is appropriateness in this. One should be bad about being bad. It is when people were full of hate in a good cause, the Northern soldier motivated only by his hatreds, that the worst errors are done. We are manage to be anti-abortion, not pro-life.

Sometimes we manage to make Christianity, a great, good truth, seem a bad thing, because we hate and use the Faith to power our hatred. This is hard, because hate is so easy. It is easy to hate bad things, hard to love what is good (and there is always some good left in anything, harder to notice when we do not hate what is bad, but only what is distasteful to us.

Booth is a warning: a man of great talents twisted not just by being wrong, but broken by hatred. God help us.

Culture

Politics

Previous Post

April 15, 2018

International Law: the Best Bad Case for Syrian Intervention

Next Post

April 17, 2018 God’s Action versus Our Need to Act (Don’t Be John Wilkes Booth)

Browse Our Archives

Select a Category Apologetics Art Culture Education On Books On Education Philosophy Politics Pop Culture Spiritual Reflections Uncategorized

Select a Month October 2026 September 2026 August 2026 July 2026 July 2025 June 2025 September 2024 July 2024 June 2024 December 2023 June 2023 September 2022 May 2022 April 2022 March 2022 February 2022 July 2021 June 2021 May 2021 April 2021 March 2021 February 2021 January 2021 December 2020 November 2020 October 2020 September 2020 August 2020 July 2020 June 2020 May 2020 April 2020 March 2020 February 2020 January 2020 December 2019 November 2019 October 2019 September 2019 August 2019 July 2019 June 2019 May 2019 April 2019 March 2019 February 2019 January 2019 December 2018 November 2018 October 2018 September 2018 August 2018 July 2018 June 2018 May 2018 April 2018 March 2018 February 2018 January 2018 December 2017 November 2017 October 2017 September 2017 August 2017 July 2017 June 2017 May 2017 April 2017 March 2017 February 2017 January 2017 December 2016 November 2016 October 2016 September 2016 August 2016 July 2016 June 2016 May 2016 April 2016 March 2016 February 2016 January 2016 December 2015 November 2015 October 2015 September 2015 August 2015 July 2015 June 2015 May 2015 April 2015 March 2015 February 2015 January 2015 November 2014 October 2014 September 2014 August 2014 July 2014 June 2014 May 2014 April 2014 March 2014 February 2014 January 2014 December 2013 November 2013 October 2013 September 2013 August 2013 July 2013 June 2013 May 2013 April 2013 March 2013 February 2013 January 2013 December 2012 November 2012 October 2012 September 2012 August 2012 July 2012 June 2012 May 2012

TAKE THE

Religious Wisdom Quiz

How did Jeremiah's scribe escape death after Jehoiakim sought to arrest them?

Select your answer to see how you score.

They hid A prophet intervened They fled to Babylon They paid a bribe

Books by This Author John Mark Reynolds

See All Titles »