The Parable of the Child’s Foot

One day while teaching, Josh was asked, ”Teacher, is the rule of law a law of rules, or is it something more?”

Josh spoke thus:

A child was not stepping onto the lawn.  The child had been told not to step onto the lawn.  The child wanted to step onto the lawn.  The child’s foot was raised.  The child’s toe was pointed at the meeting of lawn and path.  The child’s toe was approaching the lawn.  The child was hesitant.

“Put your foot down,” the child’s parent told the child.

“If I put my foot down, it will be on the lawn,” the child said.  Technically this was true.  While the child’s foot was not on the lawn, the child’s foot was above the lawn.  Were the child to have lowered the foot directly down, the child’s foot would have been on the lawn.  The child had been told not to step on the lawn, and the parent’s instruction was now clearly to step on the lawn.

“You know what I mean,” the parent said.

The child did know what the parent meant.  The child knew that the parent meant that the child should place the foot on the path.  But that was not what the parent had said.

“I’m not stepping on the lawn,” the child said.

“Put you foot back on the path,” the parent said, “Or so help me you’ll get a spanking you won’t forget.

Spanking, the parent knew, was illegal.  Striking a child in anyway was clearly prohibited by law.  The child did not know it was prohibited by law, but the child did know that the parent was not allowed to strike the child.

“You can’t spank me,” the child said.

“Do you want to find out if I can spank you?” the parent asked.  The parent stood up off of the park bench where the parent had been sitting.

“You’ll go to jail!” the child said.  But the child put the foot back on the path.  The parent sat down.  The child raised the foot.  The parent stood.  The child lowered the foot onto the path.

“How come I have to do what I’m told but you don’t?” the child asked.

“You have to mind your parents,” the parent said, “It’s in the Bible.”

“Why is it in the Bible?” the child asked.

“So children will mind their parents,” the parent said.

“Is no smoking in the park in the Bible?” the child asked.

“Don’t be smart,” the parent said.  The parent's cigarette dropped from the parent’s hand onto the lawn.

“Littering!” the child cried.  The child moved to retrieve the cigarette but could not step off the path to get it.