Christian Pacifism: A Question

John Doe

This question is directed primarily at those who know their Christian beliefs, but anyone should feel free to answer. From a Christian perspective, is violence ever acceptable? Is it considered morally better to abstain completely even if your (violent) intervention might prevent harm to others? I know the commandment 'thou shalt not kill' can be interpreted in different ways but to really follow Jesus and the New Testament shouldn't one be completely pacifist?

Puck

The command is "You shall not murder". I'm a peacful guy and I should, as a Christian, try to make peace and live in peace with others. However, if I'm attacked I'll defend myself. The important thing here is that it is self defense, I am defending my person not my ego.

If someone wants to feel like a big man and push me or even slap me in the face then fine, get it over and done with and if that's not enough here's the other cheek too. However if their intent is to injur or kill me I will try to injur or kill them instead. I don't even like hurting people though so I could not imagine what it'd be like to kill someone so this would be an absolute last resort and even then I don't really know if I could do it.

BrianCalgary

I tend to agree with Puck. I would add though, you can mess with me, but don't dare to touch my wife and kids. At which point I will protect them with a fervor not ever seen.

The Allies in WW2 had that attitude, an evil had to be stopped. Fighting was the only way, no matter how much you hated to do it.

larryone

BrianCalgary wrote:

Fighting was the only way

Fighting was the only way that those in charge could see. It has been demonstrated before that conflict between good and evil can be resolved using non-violent methods. I think of Mohandas Gandhi and his way of employing Satyagraha (the resistance of tyranny through mass civil disobedience). Non-violent methods were employed in South Africa to overthrow apartheid. How to overthrow tyranny - create a situation where the opressors dont see it as being worth their while to continue, and they fold. This can be done by blanket bombing cities. This can also be done by showing them that you refuse to play by their rules, no matter what the consequences are. To relate this back to Christianity (apologies for the cliché): What would Jesus do?

John Doe

All legitimate points: I know that I would follow (or try to follow) Puck's general idea, and also wouldn't allow anyone to try to harm my family. It's easy for me to excuse that though, because I follow Jesus as a great man whose example should (but not must) be followed.
When following Jesus as God, shouldn't one ask, as larryone said, WWJD? I would imagine he would be an eternal pacifist even when his family were threatened.

larryone

You can stil follow the example of Christ in such a situation...

Zaph0d

Pacifists are most often asked
'What would you do If someone attacks you/your family?' and
'What would you do if you were on a battlefield behind a machine gun facing rows of advancing troops?'

The answer to both questions is that there is no alternative but violence in these situations. The idea is to do everything to avoid being in this type of situation.

The opposing ideology is the 'Just War' credo.

larryone

Fight for your cause not by using violence, but by refusing to participate in anything you believe is evil. This is the way of Mohandas Gandhi, and I believe it is also the way of Christ.

Asiaprod

Zaph0d wrote:

Pacifists are most often asked
'What would you do If someone attacks you/your family?' and
'What would you do if you were on a battlefield behind a machine gun facing rows of advancing troops?'

The answer to both questions is that there is no alternative but violence in these situations. The idea is to do everything to avoid being in this type of situation.

The opposing ideology is the 'Just War' credo.

I would tend to go along with this also. Violence only if there is no other way out.
I vaguely recollect learning in school (Cristian Brothers) that in times of war, it was justified to fight for God and country. That may have changed since I was in school.

Illuvatar

Jesus never went to a roman soldier or any soldier for that matter and told him he was being evil by being a soldier. I would then assume that it's ok to kill for self defense, murder is a completely different thing. Jesus also did not say you could not defend yourself either.

Excelsior

I think that there are a couple of profitable things to consider when we consider this (vital) question.

Firstly, the response of Peter and then of Jesus to his actions in Gethsemane should bring the (relevant for today) issue of religious violence into focus. After the healing of the Roman soldier's ear, it is clear that the Christian mission can only ever be a pacifistic one. Violence will not usher in the reign of God. The Crusades or the Reformation wars or wherever else Christ was cause for war must be seen as smokescreens and charades by Christians today. You can not legitimise violence of any type in the pursuit of the Kingdom of God.

Secondly, Jesus conquered the ruling powers of the world by dying at their violent hands. Whatever one of the metaphors you choose to use, it amounts to this: the forces of evil were exhausted in killing Jesus. I can't help but think that this suffering servant casts a blazing light on the issue of war. While we might not have stopped Hitler by willing to die alongside our wives and kids without protest, I do think we are called as Christians to find an equally subversive response to the way the world works. The Christian government of the USA has spent a large amount of money and blood in the last 5 years fighting "evil" with unimaginably complex weapons. Considering Jesus (instead of putting words in his mouth) might have shown them a clearer way.

Thirdly, the God of Christianity is a warrior. Starting from the back of the book: Revelation shows the final battle in the heavenly realms, Paul before that casts the Christian life in terms of spiritual battle, Jesus warns that he has come to bring a sword between people and into the Old Testament the Prophets go to war against idolatry, the people of Israel go to war against the idol worshippers and right back to the beginning in Genesis, God overcome the chaos. There is a battle that God calls us to and it is certainly more subversive and shockingly imaginative than simple hand to hand combat.

But Christ never condemned soldiers. (The idea of him actually doing that is faintly preposterous!) He just warned them that they won't serve him by utilising their guns and swords. Dietrich Bonhoeffer wrestled with these issues as a Christian in NAZI Germany and decided to join an evangelical Christian underground resistance movement that helped establish a plot against Hitler's life. Alongside that he trained as many ministers of the Word as he could and he was eventually apprehended smuggling 13 Jews out to neutral Switzerland. He died by direct order of Himmler days before liberation. He was not a pacifist but he is an authentic follower of the Prince of Peace.

staple

This is a fascinating topic and one I've never full understood. Could Excelsior clarify his views a bit? I know this is a very complex matter.

Excelsior wrote:

Whatever one of the metaphors you choose to use, it amounts to this: the forces of evil were exhausted in killing Jesus.

How do you reconcile this with your [commonly held] view on our fallen state? Surely the world is full of evil?

"I do think we are called as Christians to find an equally subversive response to the way the world works." Could you say more about what that might be? The Christian mission is a pacifist one, but Bonhoeffer tried to kill someone. Surely there are times we must either choose to die or to use violence, or am I being reductive?

hairyheretic

There are times that violence is simply the least worst option. My own preference in a potentially violent situation would be to either walk away, or talk the situation down.

If I'm left with no choice but violence, then I will defend myself, with a response appropriate to the threat level, whether that be restraining, incapacitating, injuring or killing someone. I would say though that lethal force should only be used in a situation where you're being threatened with lethal force yourself.

Zaph0d

I'd agree with all of Excelsior's post until I get to this bit

Excelsior wrote:

Thirdly, the God of Christianity is a warrior.

says who? Is this in the bible?

Revelation shows the final battle in the heavenly realms

In stark contrast with the gospels, the Book of Revelation makes no sense to me. It appears to be interpretable in any number of ways to suit the reader.

Paul before that casts the Christian life in terms of spiritual battle, Jesus warns that he has come to bring a sword between people

metaphor?

and into the Old Testament the Prophets go to war against idolatry, the people of Israel go to war against the idol worshippers and right back to the beginning in Genesis, God overcome the chaos.

Is the Old Testament Christian? I thought it was a manual for jews with a completely different philosophy to the New Testament.

robindch

> [AsiaProd] I vaguely recollect learning in school (Cristian Brothers) that in
> times of war, it was justified to fight for God and country.

Reminds me of that bit in Angela's Ashes, when McCourt says that as a schoolboy, he was made to swear that he would die for his country and that he would die for Christ, making him wonder if either of them wanted him alive...

robindch

> > [Excelsior] Jesus warns that he has come to bring a sword between people
> [Zaph0d] metaphor?

Sadly, not a metaphor, but one of the few unerringly accurate predictions in the bible. The relevant bit from the text of Mark is here:

http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=matthew%2010:34-37;&version=9;

Puck

I've never met someone who seems to love the KJV as much as you Robin.

Excelsior

staple wrote:

Could Excelsior clarify his views a bit? I know this is a very complex matter.

Probably not. But more out of a lack of ability than intention.

Staple wrote:

How do you reconcile this with your [commonly held] view on our fallen state? Surely the world is full of evil?

Elsewhere on this forum recently I have caused a great deal of unrest amongst some through an overly-pessimistic analysis of the state of life on Earth. The world is still a dark place but I do think that light is breaking through. As this is a thread about pacificism, it might be appropriate to use a war metaphor: At Easter, God defeated the enemy. The battle has been won but is not yet over. There are still occupying forces to be moped up. But it is certain that the day is coming when the liberating forces make their triumphant march along streets lined with freed people. That is my reconciliation.

Staple wrote:

"I do think we are called as Christians to find an equally subversive response to the way the world works." Could you say more about what that might be? The Christian mission is a pacifist one, but Bonhoeffer tried to kill someone. Surely there are times we must either choose to die or to use violence, or am I being reductive?

I think Christian mission must be pacifist. If worship is the Christian life on our knees, mission is the Christian life on our feet. We must go out and join Jesus in his task (as above) of making all things new. War isn't an option there.

Bonhoeffer felt (rightly) that God is driven by the need for social justice. Faced with NAZI Germany he felt that elements within the leadership would only be defeated in battle and so he joined Abwehr. But he also sought to train leaders to proclaim the Gospel, to communicate with his friends abroad about what was happening and to smuggle as many Jews as he could out of Germany. It wasn't war and nothing, but battle as one expression of a multi-pronged approach defined by a passionate desire to follow Jesus. Bonhoeffer felt (and you see this most clearly in his Letters and Papers From Prison) that the primary way to overcome the NAZIs was through the Gospel. This is the major influence he had 10 years later on a young Martin Luther King Jr. But he did feel that killing Hitler would end the war and so end the immediate killing.

Zaphod, God is described as a warrior in the Old Testament quite a bit. I have cited some broad examples of God as someone who is happy to use war metaphors to describe how he is seeking to bring us back to him. One of the most effective means of communicating the authentic message of Christmas is as an undercover invasion of occupied territories. You can see that parallel, yeah? I do not mean to say that God fires guns or wears armour. But rather that he is happy to talk about his activities in terms of battle.

Revealtions is the most complex book of the Bible. I have had to study it a lot recently because I have been preaching from the 2nd chapter. Whatever you make of the historical/futurist/metaphorical/Easter readings of the book, it does talk quite clearly about having been written as a book to comfort Christians of the day. Alot of the symbols that today are interpreted with wild abandon (I had a Catholic seminary student suggest to me this week that it is speaks of Communist China!) would have been fairly locked down in meaning for Roman citizens in Asia Minor about the turn of the first century.

Wherever your reading lies, it does speak about God in terms of someone battling to regain the hearts of humanity and to bring light into the world. That is one example of where we can think about God as "warrior" (not literally as someone who endorses things like invasions of Iraq!).

The Old Testament is a collection of Hebrew books held as sacred documents for Judaism, Christianity and Islam. When you are referring to them as Jewish texts, it is useful to describe them as the Jewish Bible or the Hebrew Testament. Jews would not accept the title "Old Testament" since they thing it is just the Testament. They don't believe in the New Covenant of Jesus after all.

So the Old Testament is a term that refers to these 39 books when they are read through the Christian lens. These books are held equal in Christianity with the 27 books of the New Testament. This New Testament wasn't finished until 95AD so from ~30AD to ~45AD the Old Testament would have been the only sacred texts of the Christian churches. Jesus, post-resurrection, actually claims that the whole Old Testament is about him.

The whole Bible is a lot like the 6th Sense (dreadful analogy alert!). First time you watch that movie you come to the end and you're like "Whoah! Where the f*** did that come from?!" Next time you watch though you can't help but notice that no one ever talks to the Bruce Willis character or looks at him and it all fits wonderfully into place. If you read the Old Testament it is humming along nicely. Then the book of Malachi ends and there is a 400 year gap. Then the New Testament begins and it says that the promised Messiah has come as an ugly carpenter who dies on a cross and rises again and through that redeems the world and opens up the way for all people to know God. The first time you read that you are meant to go "Whoah! Where did they get that from!?" But then you go back and read it again and you see it all fits into place perfectly.

So to answer your question, the Hebrew Scriptures do not have a different philosophy, (they are definitely not a manual!) and they are Christian texts.

robindch

> I've never met someone who seems to love the KJV as much as you Robin.

Ahh, the ebb and flow flow of the KJV's English prose -- wonderful! Compare and contrast the two following bits:

http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Ecclesiastes%209:11;&version=9;

http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Ecclesiastes%209:11;&version=46;

KJV? Absolutely unbeatable -- what a pity that the story isn't a bit less two-dimensional!

Zaph0d

My problem with the Old Testament and Revelation is that they don't offer me any guidance for how to live my life, they read like mythological epics like The Iliad.

At the sermon on the mount, Jesus said:

You have heard that it was said, "An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth". But I say to you, do not resist an evildoer. If anyone strikes you on the right cheek, turn to him the other also.

So he urged people to go further than the teachings of the Old Testament that limit retribution. Throughout the New Testament, the theme is one of universal love and non-violence. The message I took from it was that often it takes greater courage to forgive someone than to attack them. This message is not present in Islam or Judaism- as far as I know.

John Doe

Thanks for your input, everyone. Unfortunately, after a marathon night of insight into the nature of people and God I have now forgotten it all, and I'm probably down a few brain cells into the bargain. I'm so incredibly slow today I can't follow your arguments.
On a previous night of epiphany I apparently told people that I was in favour of absolute pacifism. What I said was something along the lines of "if someone raped and murdered my family and made **** of everything that I love in this world, I'd have to try and love them in return." Of course, there's very little chance that I'd actually be able to do this.
I've heard that psychologists/psychiatrists would often consider someone insane if they lack the basic urge to use violent means to prevent an atrocity, when these violent means seem to be the easiest ones to hand. Maybe that's true, but could Jesus have been saying that the ability to supress these violent urges is something we should all be striving towards?
Bleh. I don't know. I'm exhausted.

larryone

Zaph0d wrote:

My problem with the Old Testament and Revelation is that they don't offer me any guidance for how to live my life, they read like mythological epics like The Iliad.

At the sermon on the mount, Jesus said:

You have heard that it was said, "An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth". But I say to you, do not resist an evildoer. If anyone strikes you on the right cheek, turn to him the other also.

So he urged people to go further than the teachings of the Old Testament that limit retribution. Throughout the New Testament, the theme is one of universal love and non-violence. The message I took from it was that often it takes greater courage to forgive someone than to attack them. This message is not present in Islam or Judaism- as far as I know.

"An eye for an eye makes the whole world blind" - Mohandas Gandhi

Excelsior

zaph0d, I would agree that the way of Jesus is one focused on love and self-sacrifice in a way that Judaism and Islam cannot claim! I also completely understand why the Old Testament and particularly Revelations does not help you in your daily life. I think both need to be introduced by experts with creative presentation to bridge the gap between their initial contexts and ours. But I do think such guides can make both meaningful.

I guess John Doe puts his finger on it. While we are called to have opinions on how we respond to crises as a state, the question of pacificism rears it's head in terms of our own lives. How far would Jesus have us go?

I don't know if he would have us not respond to the raping and killing of our families. But not because violence is the "right" there or because we are somehow entitled to violent means in extraordinary situations. I think we would be called by Jesus to stand, even with physical force against such attackers out of a love for them. Think about it. Such actions would neccessarily brutalise them. Their lives are better off by far having not raped and killed your family (or some other unlikely but illustrative scenario). Standing against them wouldn't just be an act of personal bravery, an act of sacrifice motivated by love on behalf of your family but also an act of loving mercy (within limits of course) to the attackers. Is that an insane idea?

larryone

I dont think that's an insane idea. Maybe it's an unfortunate one. Bery good post Excelsior. It'll leave my brain simmering for a while. It's so hard to know where to draw the line...

I think I need to read again about the suffering of Job. And his faith.

Excelsior

Coming at in the light of the morning I do think it borders a little on the insane. The line that can be drawn from my argument last night doesn't end so we could end up deciding that the state should install CCTV cameras into our bathrooms as an act of love in response to the risk that we, like Homer Simpson, would withdraw there to eat flowers.

Maybe it just requires a more formal definition because I do think the two step guide to theological success is:

1. Put God in the centre of the problem
2. Make love the guiding motivation

So reformulating the question to ask, "Must you be a pacifist to love your aggressor?" might prompt some good responses.

John Doe

I think that while we can't decide the actions of others or consider ourselves responsible for them, you are onto something there Excelsior. Maybe one wouldn't be justified in stopping such an attack by physical force, but it would nevertheless do far more good than harm to do so. Interesting. I suppose taking responsibility for preventing someone else's wrongdoing kinda legitimises someone else's prevention of your wrongdoing, and doesn't set a limit on how far this can go.

When you think about it, though, democracy as we practice it is full of this already: we delegate responsibility to our elected 'representatives' all the time. There is, technically, no limit to how far they could go in curbing our individual freedoms so long as we continue to grant them legitimacy.

There's also this possibility: if one has the capability to stop an evil act by violent means only but refrains from doing so because one believes they will be eternally rewarded for pacifism, is that ignoble? Imagine the sacrifice involved in putting the salvation of one's soul at risk to save someone in this life!

Excelsior

John Doe wrote:

There's also this possibility: if one has the capability to stop an evil act by violent means only but refrains from doing so because one believes they will be eternally rewarded for pacifism, is that ignoble? Imagine the sacrifice involved in putting the salvation of one's soul at risk to save someone in this life!

While that is a fascinating thought excercise, it isn't in play for a response to Christian pacificism. Remember that the whole of the Scriptures could be crudely summed up as "Its not what you do that makes you who you are but who makes you that makes you who you are". Failure to live up to one or any virtue will not damn us to hell.

Still, you probably could write a ripping little novel off the back of that idea John Doe.

John Doe

You're right, it's more concerned with a primitive sort of religion where one is doomed unless one makes the right choice in all situations. I'm rubbish at creative writing, so I'd have to hire a ghost...

pbsuxok1znja4r

BrianCalgary wrote:

I tend to agree with Puck. I would add though, you can mess with me, but don't dare to touch my wife and kids. At which point I will protect them with a fervor not ever seen.

So if some random guy slapped your wife for no reason, what would your reaction be?