that highest of ethical standards will be practised and where you will be supported and held accountable by others for doing so.
50 Alexander Balmain Bruce, The Training of the Twelve, or Passages Out of the Gospels Exhibiting the Twelve Disciples of Jesus Under Discipline for the Apostleship (Edinburgh: T & T. Clark, 1871). Note that Bruce focused on the twelve male disciples; however Jesus also had many female disciples who were included in his inner circle and whom he trained.
51 John 1:46.
52 Bruce, The Training of the Twelve, 37, emphasis added. “They were the best that could be had” is Bruce’s summation of the twelve at the time of their recruitment. Jesus himself, however, viewed them from a different perspective, describing them to his Father toward the end of his ministry as “those whom you gave me” (John 17:6).
53 Bruce, The Training of the Twelve, 106.
54 “2015 Manning Barometer,” national public opinion survey carried out January 20 to 23, 2015.
55 “Public Perceptions of the Ethics of Political Leadership,” Jim Pattison Ethical Leadership Program at Ryerson University.
56 Federal Accountability Act: An Act Providing for Conflict of Interest Rules, Restrictions on Election Financing and Measures Respecting Administrative Transparency, Oversight and Accountability (S.C. 2006, c. 9).
57 See Preston Manning, Think Big: My Adventures in Life and Democracy (Toronto: McClelland & Stewart, 2002), 117.
58 See Manning, Think Big, 118–120.
59 In this regard I am reminded of a study of political integrity by the historian D. C. Somervell that focused on the lives of two 19th century British statesmen. These were William Gladstone, the moralist, who if he didn’t see right and wrong in an issue was uninterested, and Benjamin Disraeli, the pragmatist, who rarely saw right or wrong in any issue, only differences of opinion. And what was Somervell’s conclusion? That while it is an error to discover moral issues when none are in fact at stake, it is a greater error to be blind to them when moral issues really arise (see D. C. Somervell, Gladstone and Disraeli [Garden City: Garden City Publishing Company, 1928], 66).
60 Deontological is derived from the Greek word for duty or “that which is binding.”
61 Matthew 22:37–40.
62 Bruce, The Training of the Twelve, 43.
63 1 Corinthians 13:4–7.
64 John 15:12.
65 Mark 10:17–18.
66 Matthew 5:17–19.
67 See Galatians 3:24.
68 Matthew 5:21–22, 27–28.
69 “Woe to you, teachers of the law and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You give a tenth of your spices—mint, dill and cumin. But you have neglected the more important matters of the law—justice, mercy and faithfulness. You should have practiced the latter, without neglecting the former. You blind guides! You strain out a gnat but swallow a camel” (Matthew 23:23–24).
70 “Now there were some present at that time who told Jesus about the Galileans whose blood Pilate had mixed with their sacrifices. Jesus answered, ‘Do you think that these Galileans were worse sinners than all the other Galileans because they suffered this way? I tell you, no! But unless you repent, you too will all perish. Or those eighteen who died when the tower in Siloam fell on them—do you think they were more guilty than all the others living in Jerusalem? I tell you, no! But unless you repent, you too will all perish’” (Luke 13:1–5).
71 See John 17.
1.6 TRAINING: MANAGING AMBITION
The Ambitions of the Disciples
In almost all political systems, from the
authoritarian one-party regime of Communist China to the multi-party democratic systems of the West, personal political ambition plays a major part in initiating and sustaining the involvement of those desiring positions and offices of influence. Personal ambition is also frequently present as a driving force among persons desiring positions of influence in religious and charitable organizations.
It should not surprise us therefore to find personal ambition thrusting itself to the fore among Jesus’ band of initial followers. And since Jesus was offering the “kingdom of heaven”—“kingdom” being a political concept and “heaven” being a spiritual one—it should not surprise us that their ambitions were a combination of the spiritual and the political.
On one occasion, for example, we are told that James and John, two of Jesus’ closest and most faithful associates, accompanied by their mother, came to him requesting that they be given key cabinet posts in the future government of the kingdom.72 Needless to say, this open display of ambition by James and John stirred up indignation on the part of the other ten disciples.
On yet another occasion, while they were travelling along the road to Capernaum, the disciples fell to arguing among themselves as to who would be “the greatest” in the future kingdom.73 Apparently, they sensed that this was an unseemly argument among the followers of one who was teaching them to put the interests of others ahead of their own, because they conducted it out of Jesus’ hearing and were embarrassed when he later asked them what they had been quarrelling about.
Even on the sad and dramatic occasion of the Last Supper, when Jesus addressed his disciples for the last time and predicted his own self-sacrificial death, it is recorded that, again, “a dispute also arose among them as to which of them was considered to be the greatest.”74 Ambition—how to advance themselves, how to be the greatest—always seemed to be not far from their minds no matter what the occasion or circumstance.
The Management of Personal Ambition
So how did Jesus deal with personal ambition on the part of his
