POST SERIES
Introduction
Views of Christian Participation and War
Jesus on Violence and the Kingdom in Matthew 5:38-44
Paul on Empire and Submission in Romans 13:1-7
The Kingdom of Heaven and Christian Identity
Analyzing War and Christian Participation in Light of a Kingdom-Identity
A Christian Response to War
Conclusion
A few days ago we began a series on what a Christian posture should before violence generally and war particularly. Today picks up the discussion with Jesus’ teachings on enemy-love in the so-called “Sermon on the Mount.” Here is the crux of Jesus’ argument, which I make below: “this teaching instructs that even though there are bad people in the world, bad people who desire to harm the disciples, their admitted badness is no justification for the disciple resisting them, whether actively or passively, violently or nonviolently, legally or illegally.” If this is true, what does this mean for our broader issue of guns, and Christians insisting on protecting the 2nd amendment right to bear arms in order to resist bad people? What does this mean for Christian participation in violence, especially armed conflict?
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After establishing the dominant views of war and Christian participation, it is necessary to attend to the perspectives of Jesus Christ and Paul the apostle. In Matthew 5:38-44 Jesus provides the starkest admonition regarding Christians faced with violence: love your enemies. Along side His application of the Shema—love the lord your God with all your heart, soul mind and strength; love your neighbor as yourself—He includes the necessity to do “enemy-love.” How does this work in the context of a democratic nation, though? What are the responsibilities of Christians to the State regarding involvement in war in light of Jesus’ teachings on enemy-love? Paul provides an understanding of that relationship to Empire in Romans 13:1-7. This passage is often used to justify involvement because it instructs Christians to submit themselves to the “governing authorities” and insists those authorities are established to wield the sword. Does this passage instruct Christian participation in war, though? Examining Jesus’ perspective on violence and the Kingdom of God and Paul’s viewpoint regarding Empire submission will bring clarity in order to analyze war and Christian participation.
A. Jesus on Violence and the Kingdom in Matthew 5:38-44
The end of Matthew 4 tells of Jesus going “throughout Galilee, teaching in their synagogues, proclaiming the good news of the kingdom, and healing every disease and sickness among the people.” ((Matt. 4:23.)) Part of this proclamation came in the form of one of the most recognized and widely known set if teachings in the so-called Sermon on the Mount. After calling the disciples to “follow me,” Jesus went up on a mountainside and instructed them in the way of the Kingdom of Heaven. These instructions were to his disciples, instructions calling them to live by a set of stringent standards articulated in six antitheses (established in the “You have heard that it was said…But I tell you…” formula) ((Richard A. Burridge, Imitating Jesus(Grand Rapids: Eerdmans Publishing,2007), 216 notes that this unique Mathean formula is “part of his intensifying interpretation of the law.”)) in order to represent the reality of the Kingdom of Heaven in their pluralist, sinful world. ((Hays, Moral Vision, 321.)) The fifth and six of these antithesis is in regards to anti-retributional violence in the form of loving ones enemies.
Amazingly, this teaching instructs that even though there are bad people in the world, bad people who desire to harm the disciples, their admitted badness is no justification for the disciple resisting them, whether actively or passively, violently or nonviolently, legally or illegally. ((R.T France, Matthew, (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans Publishing 2007, 219-220.)) Jesus tangibly illustrates this through four examples: a slap on a cheek, suing in law court for the disciples shirt, the Roman military machine enlisting someone to carry the equipment of a soldier, and a request for money or goods. ((Matt. 5:39-42.)) In the face of these “violent” acts, Jesus tells the disciples to act counterculturally: a slap was a serious insult in which legal redress could be sought, though Jesus tells the disciples to accept the insult without responding and forego the financial benefit to which he is legally entitled; though someone demands his shirt, he is to give up his rightfully held coat, even at the expense of having nothing to wear; while a Roman prefect might require the legally permitted “mile” from a disciple, she is to accept the imposition and double it; and finally the disciple is to reflect the remarkable generosity of Deut. 15:7-11 to help a fellow Israelite in need. ((France, Matthew, 219-222.)) With each of these four instructional illustrations, Jesus requires His disciples to live and lean into them, ending with the instruction of enemy-love.
The final antithesis is enemy-love. The core of Jesus’ teachings is the combination of the Jewish Shema of Deut. 6:4-5 (“love God…”) and Lev. 19:18 (“love your neighbor as yourself.”) Important to this present discussion is understanding what is meant by the term “neighbor.” “For most contemporary interpreters the term was restrictive, leaving non-neighbors outside the command to love; hence the popular addition ‘and hate your enemy,’” ((France, Matthew, 223.)) of which Jesus quotes in 5:43. For Jesus neighbor becomes broadly inclusive, even to the point of loving ones enemies. This radical perspective does not delineate whether or not He means personal affronts or political enemies, which during this time would have been the occupying forces of Rome, but instead is entirely comprehensive: “enemy” includes all classes. ((France, Matthew, 225.)) In fact, Jesus’ demands go beyond the negative demands He made in vs. 39-42 to include the positive requirements to seek the good of those who are oppressing them, to “pray for those who persecute you.” ((Matt 5:43.)) Not only are followers of Jesus called to actively non-resist, they are also called to actively do acts of enemy-love.
It is obvious that the teachings of Jesus in this pericope call the disciple to a radical way of living that is both countercultural and counterintuitive. This is the entire point of Matthew’s vision: “Matthew offers a vision of a radical countercultural community of discipleship characterized by a ‘higher righteousness’—a community free of anger, lust, falsehood, and violence.” ((Hays, Moral Vision, 322.)) This ‘higher righteousness’ was demonstrated by Jesus Himself in the Garden of Gethsemane when He fought His own disciple who wanted to violently resist the authorities who were taking Him away to be tried and executed. “This scene at the arrest is the authentic interpretation of the sentence in the Sermon on the Mount, ‘Do not resist an evildoer.’” ((Ulrich Mauser, The Gospel of Peace (Louisville: Westminster John Knox, 1992), 80.)) As such, the prophetic task of nonviolence and nonresistance instructed in the Sermon and exemplified in Jesus, while seeming ridiculous and arduous, is not impossible, even in the face of an Empire who insists and requires otherwise.
"This teaching instructs that even though there are bad people in the world, bad people who desire to harm the disciples, their admitted badness is no justification for the disciple resisting them, whether actively or passively, violently or nonviolently, legally or illegally."
I have a feeling we'll disagree about this Jeremy. First question: is it really true that armed self defense is used in the moment because the attacker is a bad person? In my hours of firearms training, both on the legal and technical side of issue, the standard for legal and ethical violence with a deadly weapon is always this: am I in reasonable fear of immanent death or serious bodily harm for myself or someone around me?
That's the standard in the vast majority of our country for armed self defense, such as with guns. So I think it's a little sloppy to use language of good vs. evil persons in this discussion. That has almost nothing to do with the ethics of violence. The question is what evil you can stop from happening by using violence when that's the only viable option at the time.
Helpful, Jeremy. I especially appreciate how you make it clear that Jesus' command to love our enemies applies across the board in every station of life. I will be most interested in the rest of your posts. I really wrestle with the conviction that Christians are never to participate in violence (end of Romans 12), and the seeming sanction of limited violence ("bearing not the sword in vain" as "servants of God"- beginning of Romans 13. Seems like most Christians must put the end of Romans 12 on some kind of personal level, while making Romans 13 open up some allowance for the use of some kind of even divinely sanctioned use of violence to restrain evildoers.
http://articles.nydailynews.com/2012-06-12/news/3…
If you were a Christian father, it would be your Christian duty to do something similar to this guy. It is occasionally loving to engage in violence. But circumstances like immediacy of the threat, the severity of probable harm, all play into the law of love, and how it's applied. Love to whom?
A Christian duty to " beat her alleged attacker to death with repeated punches to the head." Duty? Though I do believe that nonviolent action is the way of the kingdom of god, I am very sympathetic to "circumstances of immediacy of threat" as you call them. But even in such cases we have 2000 years of spiritual disciplines to help train us in the labor of love when such situations come about. The question becomes: What is gained, by killing this man? Where is the reconciliation? Where is the restoration? None of these can be had because the person is dead. And then you end up with situations like this: "A relative of the 23-year-old father, who was not identified by local reports, said he was later remorseful for killing the suspected predator"
Clarification: my point is not that he should kill the man. He didn't mean to. The point is that sometimes voilent action is needed to rescue another. Would you rather the father reason with the man and non-violently ask to please stop raping his daughter? I'd hope you'd go straight to violence against immediate violence. Let's say you saw an old lady getting beaten up. I hope you wouldn't ask her to be non-violent and seek reconciliation. Stop the attack now, because she could be dead.
I'm happy to allow an individual to choose non-violence when the only person effected is themselves. But there is a Christian duty to violence when you need to protect your wife and children most of the time (there are exceptions for moments of persecution).
In fact, there are laws on the books in some states that say if you don't intervene, you are legally culpable.
I don't think that anybody who advocates that nonviolent conflict resolution and peacemaking as central to the gospel would say that one does not intervene when someone is being harmed. Nonviolence does not mean "no action."
Christian peacemaking and nonviolence is better understood as a framework within which one carries out certain actions. Narrowing it down to specific "if your grandma was getting mugged" situations misses the broader systemic framework that is functioning at a broader social level.
When this new framework of peace is articulated and put into micro practice at the parish level through works of mercy and the liturgy only then will habits begin to form that will help in the extreme situations you posit in the post above.
It's not an extreme example, and your answer sidesteps the issue of whether violence is ever the right move. It's a very normal example for some people. I was walking home just Friday as a man was mugged by a youth not 200 feet from my front door. Violence is the norm in some places. I would daresay even MLK would have defended his family given the right circumstances. Nonviolence notwithstanding, the statement speaks in straw-man world: “this teaching instructs that even though there are bad people in the world, bad people who desire to harm the disciples, their admitted badness is no justification for the disciple resisting them, whether actively or passively, violently or nonviolently, legally or illegally.”
There clearly is just justification for standing up to to evil violently, and it has to do with immediacy of the threat, reasonable harm, and means you have at your disposal. No one who advocates armed resistance would argue that violence should be used simply because someone is a bad person. Isn't it more just to allow a little old lady, a paraplegic, or me to carry a gun, which will even the odds in a confrontation?
I wan't trying to side step. I guess it depends upon what you deem as "violence." This could range from subduing and restraining an attacker to beating someone to death with repeated punches to the head. Like I said, I don't think any person who practices Christian peacemaking would say that one cannot subdue or intervene when someone is in danger.
You seems to be concerned with whether or not one is justified in one's use of violence in regards to a standing with God and the church. That is, is the use of violence a sin or counter to the coming Kingdom. Though you accuse me of sidestepping the issue, I would say you are actually missing the point. The kingdom of God articulates an entirely different framework for engaging with conflict situations. From the beginning peace and reconciliation are the ground motives in engagement with conflict.
But to appease this desire for justification I would use Bonhoeffer as an example of one who views their choice of violence in the eyes of God:
“When a man takes guilt upon himself in responsibility, he imputes his guilt to himself and no one else. He answers for it… Before other men he is justified by dire necessity; before himself he is acquitted by his conscience, but before God he hopes only for grace” (Ethics)
Though Bonhoeffer was a staunch pacifist, committed to the peaceable kingdom, in the wake of Hitler's military conquests he saw no other option. But that did not mean he felt justified by his actions. He carried out his role in the assassination attempt fully aware of its sinful/anti-kingdom nature and threw himself at God's mercy.
So I would answer your "issue" with a somber "no". As Christians, the foretaste of the Kingdom to come, we are not justified in any appeal or use of coercive-power or violence. Such actions are the ways of the world and the work of the evil one. But take heart in such circumstance when we fall short of the high calling that is the Kingdom of God "for the Lord is good; and his mercy endures forever." Amen.
Jeremy uses the example of someone slapping you in the face as an example Christ used to talk about violence. If someone slapping you in the face is violence (intended as an insult), then restraining an attacker surely is. Again, I'm saying the statement Jeremy advances is sloppy about actual circumstances that warrant violence. Non-violence has it's place, but it's not absolute. Violence has it's place, but it's not absolute. Gun violence is one of the only ways to "stop a threat now," which is the goal of those who reasonably advocate an armed society. My armed self defense trainers, who included lawyers who have advocated gun rights before the US Supreme Court, advocated firearms to be used in only very limited cases.
Though the "turn the other cheek" teaching is used by many as an analogy to situations of attack (mugging) it has more to do with the cultural implications of not returning one's intent to insult….thus shaming them in their action. Jeremy does not use it in reference to an attack but in reference to pursuing legal recourse. Thus, it has no direct implications to the restraining of an attacker. In regards to the rest of your comment, I understand your position and responded to it in the previous reply.
Something that seems absent from your objections is any appeal to the Scriptures or the Christian tradition to back up your quasi-theological claim that violence and non-violence has its place in the world.
I agree that the turn the other cheek mantra is in relation to insult rather than violence. That's why I think the kingdom ethic for a general love to one's fellow man doesn't necessarily preclude violence in an immediate, life-threatening situation. The text of Jeremy's post is as follows.
"Amazingly, this teaching instructs that even though there are bad people in the world, bad people who desire to harm the disciples, their admitted badness is no justification for the disciple resisting them, whether actively or passively, violently or nonviolently, legally or illegally.4 Jesus tangibly illustrates this through four examples: a slap on a cheek, suing in law court for the disciples shirt, the Roman military machine enlisting someone to carry the equipment of a soldier, and a request for money or goods.5 In the face of these “violent” acts, Jesus tells the disciples to act counterculturally: a slap was a serious insult in which legal redress could be sought, though Jesus tells the disciples to accept the insult without responding and forego the financial benefit to which he is legally entitled; though someone demands his shirt, he is to give up his rightfully held coat, even at the expense of having nothing to wear; while a Roman prefect might require the legally permitted “mile” from a disciple, she is to accept the imposition and double it; and finally the disciple is to reflect the remarkable generosity of Deut. 15:7-11 to help a fellow Israelite in need.6 With each of these four instructional illustrations, Jesus requires His disciples to live and lean into them, ending with the instruction of enemy-love."
So again, I suggest Jeremy (if not you) is presenting an argument where no foe exists. Almost no one in the self defense world recommends violence based on the attacker being the bad guy who deserves it. Rather violence is the correct action when there isn't an alternative. Further, a firearm is the one thing that can stop a threat of almost any size right now. My firearms trainers would say it's not about killing an attacker. It's about stopping them right now. A shot with a .22 pistol will kill a man eventually, but it probably won't stop them right now. A shock with a stun gun isn't a reliable means either. This is why I think self defense with such a pistol is probably immoral depending on available recourse. Either a defender didn't need to shoot an attacker, or he meant to kill, not stop them. Unfortunately killing a person is a side effect of shooting them in a way that stops them right now. This means a more violent set of arms is needed. A shot with a 9mm pistol round or above in the heart, lungs, throat or head will stop the threat immediately. This is the kind of protection I would like to afford a widow, walking alone on the street. It is such a protection that I think is implied by consistant biblical demands to protect the weak. Removing the power of weak individuals to protect themselves via firearms through law is a really bad idea.
Also, do you really want to argue that violence has no place for us from the Bible? Really? I await Jeremy's further posts to see what he says on the matter, but remember our God is a God who protects his flock with a staff and pursues justice with a sword. It's really easy to show by example, especially in the Old Testament, that violence is the answer sometimes. It's God's own answer in certain circumstances when no other method will do.
I think we might be talking about something similar but from different sides. It might help to narrow down what"violence" pertains to. Most people currently participating in Chrisitian peacemaking around the world right now would consider non-lethal restraint as appropriate in the moments of immediate attack. If you consider this counter violence then this may be where our two visions for proper Christian response to violence overlap. Though, I think it is only a thin piece of a venn diagram.
We may be reaching an impasse in regards to our two visions for the Christian response to violence. And this is fine, if the Christian faith wasn't diverse in its participation and belief it wouldn't be as interesting as it is. It is my conviction that the quote you presented of Jeremy's paper is a removal of all justification in "eye for and eye" reaction to being wronged in any fashion. But this does not mean inaction. Rather, Jesus posits an alternative action (not simply negotiation or reasoning). This alternative is real and effective. I would suggest looking into Christian Peacemaker Teams http://www.cpt.org/ where this alternative isn't just a theory or theology but actually lived out in war torn countries around the world and in domestic violence situations in the United States.
In regards to the Bible comment, yes I do really want to argue that violence has no place for us from the Bible. You are correct God is the judge and we wait for his Judgement of the living and the dead. But we are not God and we are instructed to let Christ do the judging. In regards to the violence of the OT I suggest Walter Brueggeman's Divine Presence amid Violence. Thankfully, the resurrection of Christ has begun the breaking open of the Peaceable Kingdom of God and the Church, through the power of the Spirit, is to be its witness.
Also this "coercive power" you say is out for Christians: isn't it coercive to hold down an attacker while he's trying to kill you, or rape your daughter? Good grief. Be consistent.
My use of coercive referred specifically to governmental use of force: aka War.
OK, fantastic, what about in self defense. Why are governmental uses of force and private ones so intrinsically different?
I have commented a few time in regards to self defense and peacemaking. Certain non-lethal restraint is practiced in Christian peacemaking training. Up until Augustine and Constantine there was almost unanimous refusal of military and government participation by the early Church. Jesus was Lord, then.
Incidentally, did you know Martin Luther King applied for a concealed carry permit, but was rejected by police? That's right, Mr. Non-Violence had no problem protecting his person or his family. The reason he advocated non-violence was that it would work to create culture change in the main. He didn't think that in the trenches it was always the best course of action.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/adam-winkler/mlk-an…
There is a long line of non-violent Christian figures that stretches back to Stephen the Martyr. I appreciate Dr. King's work but he is not the only voice. Thus, "Mr. Non-Violence" applying for a concealed carry permit does not somehow negate the last two thousand years of Christian's trying to live nonviolently.