The Virginia Tech killings have not only kick started the gun control debate, but the idea of Christian pacifism. If a Christian in that classroom had a gun, would they be justified in killing Cho to stop the immediate killing, or would he just be encouraging more violence by committing violence?
Dethroner thinks that "Christian Soldier" is an oxymoron. I think Christian Pacifism is an oxymoron. You decide.
I think we are called to lay our life down for our friends, not to lay our life down for our friends to get killed right after us.
So you think it is immoral for a Christian to be a cop our a military person who must kill in the line of duty?
BTW, check out this comment for a good defense of Christians involved in the justice and military fields.
The basic arguments boil down to the fact that we live in two kingdoms, and that in the worldly kingdom, God has established civil government for the purpose of justice and protection of the innocent against law breakers. Pacifism denies these valid biblical approaches because it confuses our role in each kingdom. Something like that.
Alright Keith, check out those three articles, and let me know what you think.
I used to be a Christian pacifist, until I hear a sermon entitled "Does God take sides in war?"
The answer is a little complex, but it is a YES. I note these items:
– Israel was a theocracy, so political and religious decisions were both directed by God
– The Christian church does NOT function like Israel, and there is a clear separation of biblical and civil powers in NT biblical thought
– While the church should not be directing armies, it is responsible for raising up Godly public servants
– In civil government, there is biblical support for the administration of justice, which includes defending the public against foreign aggressors.
– While the Kingdom of God is not spread by the sword, nor can it be conquered by the sword (being made up primarily of the hearts of those submitted to Christ here), the administration of justice and freedom can and should be enforced judiciously with force if necessary by nations and civil governments.
– Hence the idea of the Christian Patriot is biblical, as long as we realize that in the name of civil and national justice, we are not spreading the KOG, but we are operating by biblical principle in protecting the innocent and punishing the wicked.
Hi Seeker:
A response to the “two kingdom” argument against pacifism. I borrow quite shamelessly from Mennonite ethicist John Howard Yoder (I hope I don’t misrepresent his thought).
Romans 13:1Everyone must submit himself to the governing authorities, for there is no authority except that which God has established. The authorities that exist have been established by God. 2Consequently, he who rebels against the authority is rebelling against what God has instituted, and those who do so will bring judgment on themselves. 3For rulers hold no terror for those who do right, but for those who do wrong. Do you want to be free from fear of the one in authority? Then do what is right and he will commend you. 4For he is God’s servant to do you good. But if you do wrong, be afraid, for he does not bear the sword for nothing. He is God’s servant, an agent of wrath to bring punishment on the wrongdoer. 5Therefore, it is necessary to submit to the authorities, not only because of possible punishment but also because of conscience. 6This is also why you pay taxes, for the authorities are God’s servants, who give their full time to governing. 7Give everyone what you owe him: If you owe taxes, pay taxes; if revenue, then revenue; if respect, then respect; if honor, then honor.
From this passage anti-pacifists argue that it is legitimate for Christians to use the “sword” since (a) all governments are established by God to promote justice and (b) those governments use violence as a necessary means toward that end. There are a couple of problems with that reading of the passage, it seems to me:
1. The interpretation implies that governments like that of Hitler or Stalin were legitimate, since there is “is no authority except that which God has established”. I don’t know any Christians who would accept the Nazis or Stalinist Russia as legitimate. The passage isn’t really about Christians participating in the military or police force, it is about
2. Well, I can’t think of what I was thinking of for number (2):-). Except maybe this: it seems difficult to square using the sword on a military enemy with loving that enemy which is what Christ mandated.
But if we remember that God can providentially guide events so that even sinful actions can result in good things. It was wrong that the Romans executed Jesus—Jesus was innocent of crime—and yet God used that injustice to accomplish salvation of the world. The same is true for the Nazi government; their actions were evil—actions chosen by the Nazis, not by God—but God could take that evil as sort of the raw material and bring something good from it. If so, then Romans 13 doesn’t imply that the government can without committing sin use violence; it just means that given the fact that government will use violence God can still guide things to end well.
The thing is: the passage isn’t really about Christians participating in the military or police force, it is about Christians submitting to the authority of the government. This doesn’t require us to obey their evil commands, it just requires us to submit to the penalties they would impose if we refuse to obey any evil orders they might issue. Thus, Romans 13 doesn’t constitute a rebuttal of Christian pacifism.
Your Friend
Keith
HI Seeker:
Going off half-cocked, I am going to respond to your post after only having read the article you linked regarding the "two kingdom" argument. My first response was to that argument, this one will be to your post. I'll try to read those other articles, but right now I'm in a train of thought.
You wrote: I used to be a Christian pacifist, until I hear a sermon entitled "Does God take sides in war?"
The answer is a little complex, but it is a YES. I note these items:
– Israel was a theocracy, so political and religious decisions were both directed by God…
Which is why the Old Testament wars cannot be used to argue against pacifism. There is no reason for a Christian to believe that God ordered any of the wars fought after ancient Israel.
– The Christian church does NOT function like Israel, and there is a clear separation of biblical and civil powers in NT biblical thought
– While the church should not be directing armies, it is responsible for raising up Godly public servants
In that if any Christian is a public servant, she should be Godly. But this doesn't imply that Christians can morally perform every job the civil powers exercise. It arguably was OK for a Christian in the USSR to work in trash pickup, but not for the KGB.
– In civil government, there is biblical support for the administration of justice, which includes defending the public against foreign aggressors.
I addressed this point in my other post.
– While the Kingdom of God is not spread by the sword, nor can it be conquered by the sword (being made up primarily of the hearts of those submitted to Christ here), the administration of justice and freedom can and should be enforced judiciously with force if necessary by nations and civil governments.
I don't see that this follows from Romans 13. Romans 13 doesn't say that using force is the best way to promote freedom, it merely says that we Christians ought submit to the government authorities.
Voluntarily going to jail rather than participating in the military would be one way of submitting.
– Hence the idea of the Christian Patriot is biblical, as long as we realize that in the name of civil and national justice, we are not spreading the KOG, but we are operating by biblical principle in protecting the innocent and punishing the wicked.
I guess I don't that Christian patriotism follows at all. Protecting the innocent is important; so is loving our enemies. Using lethal violence against our enemies seems on the face of it to be inimical to loving them. A violent action we might take causes ripples throughout the rest of time and it is nearly impossible to accurately calculate whether the bad side effects will outweigh the supposed good that we hope comes from it. WW II arguable happened because of WW I, and WW II didn't save the Jews nor save the lives of so many innocent people in Germany and the rest of Europe. Then there's the spiritual effects: loving our enemies carries with it a spiritual benefit, choosing not to eliminates that benefit. I'd say there is very little evidence that violence does protect the innocent when you factor in all the bad that inevitably comes with the supposed good.
your friend
Keith
I don't see that this follows from Romans 13. Romans 13 doesn't say that using force is the best way to promote freedom, it merely says that we Christians ought submit to the government authorities.
No one said it is the BEST way to promote freedom, but force is sometimes necessary to defend freedom. Also, these passages you mention do not prohibit the use of force, so you can't get pacifism from them.
And just because we are not a theocracy does not mean that God has suddenly become a pacifist in world affairs. It just means that the Church is not involved in establishing justice.
The fact that the OT called for capital punishment means that such killing in the line of justice is not against biblical principle.
There is more to say, but I am tired. However, I think that pacifism is both impractical in the face of immanent, deadaly threat, and unbiblical.
Hi Seeker:
You wrote:
No one said [violence] is the BEST way to promote freedom, but force is sometimes necessary to defend freedom….
I'm sure I wasn't clear, so let me try to clarify what I was saying. If violence were sometimes necessary to defend freedom then in those circumstances it would be the best way available. My point was that Romans 13 never suggests that there isn't always a better alternative than violence and it gives no support than I can for the idea that Christians ought to participate in the violence the state engages in.
Also, these passages you mention do not prohibit the use of force, so you can't get pacifism from them.
But I can get pacifism from the passages where Jesus commands us to love our enemies, it seems to me.
And just because we are not a theocracy does not mean that God has suddenly become a pacifist in world affairs. It just means that the Church is not involved in establishing justice.
Whether or not it could theoretically be proper for God to mandate war in come theoretical context seems to me to be a side issue. I'd say the Christian has no reason to think that God has commanded anyone sicne ancient Israel to engage in war. My point in mentioning this was to show why the Old Testament doesn't refute Christian pacifism.
The fact that the OT called for capital punishment means that such killing in the line of justice is not against biblical principle.
That God might give a specific set of laws to people he called for a particular mission doesn't imply that he was proclaiming a principle that was to apply to all people for all time.
There is more to say, but I am tired. However, I think that pacifism is both impractical in the face of immanent, deadaly threat, and unbiblical.
You'd hardly be alone in your opinion, Seeker. I guess I would counter that non-pacifism has proved to be fairly impractical as well, given the horrific damage that has been done to the weak and powerless in the name of "protecting" the weak and powerless. Also, I know a lot of people who would argue that loving your enemies is impractical, but Christ didn't say love them only when it seems like it will work. Loving our enemies seemed to be the point, not the means to accomplishing something else. It seems to me to be a more powerful witness to the world if we are willing to take the blows that come from loving our enemies even when it'd be more "practical" to fight them. Being a better witness seems to me to be the most practical thing of all.
your Friend
Keith
But I can get pacifism from the passages where Jesus commands us to love our enemies, it seems to me.
Does love allow your enemies to come and slaughter your family. You see, love and TRUTH work together, and truth includes justice. If you come into my house to do me harm, the most loving thing for me to do is not to let you do me harm, but to get you into the criminal justice system for reform and help.
Loving our enemies does not mean we should let them run roughshod over us and our loved ones, whom we are also commanded to love. That's a misapplication of the principle.
Jesus said if your enemy hungers, feed him. That's the principle – being kind. But I believe that self-defense is not against Christian principle, and loving your enemy does not include being an enabler of his evil intentions, or allowing him to take from you.
When you go into an enemy's house, you bind the strong man. You tie him up, in order to do justice. (Jesus said this with respect to demons, but he was referring to a natural principle).
Hi Seeker:
You asked a tough question–IMO the issue of peace/war is not as clear cut as a lot of people on both sides imagine. Let me try to address your point.
Does love allow your enemies to come and slaughter your family. You see, love and TRUTH work together, and truth includes justice. If you come into my house to do me harm, the most loving thing for me to do is not to let you do me harm, but to get you into the criminal justice system for reform and help.
1. Pacifism doesn't require you to use no force at all. For example, a loving parent would forcibly restrain his child if that child were, in a fit of delusion, placing his hand in the flame of a stove. But obviously the parent wouldn't kill his child for that because it would be unloving to do so. It is similarly unloving to your enemy to kill him, it seems to me.
2. Protecting your family from danger is important, no doubt, but is there no limit to what you can properly do to protect them? For example, would it be morally permissible to kill your neighbor's children and steal their food if your children needed the food? Would it be OK to cause a thousand of your neighbors to die if that were necessary to protect your family? If not, then you agree there are acts that might seem necessary to protect your family but because they are immoral we ought not do them. In other words, morality trumps expediency even when we are talking about our responsibility to our own.
3. Does violence really protect our families, or are we teaching them to lack faith in God's promises when the chips are down. Jesus told us to seek first God's righteousness, then all the things we really need will be added to us. If part of God's righteousness is loving his enemies then it seems to me that we are mandated to do the same, even if that hastens the inevitable death we will all be facing. Now, I am not claiming I have the courage to do this, I am not even 100% sure I am right about it in the case of a criminal attacking the innocent. of course warfare is a different thing entirely–nearly everyone involved is innocent.
Loving our enemies does not mean we should let them run roughshod over us and our loved ones, whom we are also commanded to love. That's a misapplication of the principle.
I think loving our enemies might well require us to refrain from killing them.
Jesus said if your enemy hungers, feed him. That's the principle – being kind. But I believe that self-defense is not against Christian principle, and loving your enemy does not include being an enabler of his evil intentions, or allowing him to take from you.
I don't see how you can find biblical support for self-defense–self-sacrifice is the model we get from Christ. It's a tougher issue when we talk about defending the innocent, it seems to me.
When you go into an enemy's house, you bind the strong man. You tie him up, in order to do
I do not believe that physical violence was the point Jesus was making when he used that example.
your friend
Keith
Protecting your family from danger is important, no doubt, but is there no limit to what you can properly do to protect them? For example, would it be morally permissible to kill your neighbor's children and steal their food if your children needed the food?
There is a large difference between self defense, and stealing or killing others in order to TAKE from them something that is not yours.
Protecting your family and homeland is important, and because pacifism will not protect with lethal force, it will inevitably be conquered by evil. And I don't think this position is biblical – we need a more developed view of such things.
Some points to consider in the defense of action, not pacifism
– "turn the other cheek" is not a global command to never use force. Note that Jesus consciously made a whip and chased out the money changers. And he was angry. Turn the other cheek refers to non-lethal threats – it has to do with suffering insult (which a slap on the cheek is). It may also include accepting physical attacks or martyrdom, but I doubt it means that under all conditions.
– "love your enemies" is a command to be kind and not hate, but does not mean that we should not defend ourselves
– as I said, conditions that do not involve immanent death can and should be dealt with using non-physical or non-lethal methods, but overly developed wicked nations and people need to be restrained, punished, or killed with force in order to protect others. I beleive that my anaology of natural medicine v. surgery in treating diseases is a good one – if a disease is very far advanced, long-term methods will not work, even though they are desirable for many reasons.
There certainly is a place for being a peacemaker, for accepting insults graciously, for accepting the pillaging of our posesssions, and other persecution. However, if we are to think biblically about civil government (which we should about all areas of life), we must establish justice with the force of physical might in order to protect the innocent. And as head of my family government (see The Five Spheres of Government), I am responsible for protecting my family, and I take that seriously. It is my Christian duty to protect them – not retaliate after the fact, but protect them beforehand. Those who think we should all be willing to die for our faith when the next Muslim whacko comes to our house will probably die before me.
Have you seen the movies Sgt. York or the Mission? Both deal with passive v. active resistance.
You may also want to check out these links that defend xian self defense:
Did Jesus advocate the use of a sword for self-defense purposes (Luke 22:36-38)?
Also, note this passage – NOT intervening to protect others is a sin! So not protecting your family or someone in peril must be considered unloving.
What does the Bible say about self-defense?
Hi Seeker:
I have a couple of comments (maybe more:-)
1. Matthew 5:38-42: I would say the passage is a mandate for us not to demand the justice we are entitled to (the "eye for an eye" is mentioned) but should rather react in kindness even to the person who wrongs us. I am not using this passage alone to justify my pacifism. I am putting considerable weight on the Lord's mandate to love our enemies. It still seems hard to square enemy-loving with enemy-killing, especially killing so-called enemies in war.
2. John 8:59: I'm not sure what point you intend with this verse. Is it just that Jesus didn't allow himself to be arrested at that moment? I don't see how that has much to do with using violence for self-defense. Being (as we are called to be) imitators of Christ obviously doesn't demand that we be hung on a cross so our deaths can save the world, but surely it does mean we have to be willing to sacrifice our own well-being even for our enemies. That seems to me to be part of loving them. It seems to me that you aren't addressing the "love your enemies" issue.
3. Luke 22:36-38: I don't see that this passage implies the Christian self-defense is OK. Here Jesus seemed to be talking about the immediately upcoming events that ended with his arrest. Clearly he didn't intend the two swords to be used in self-defense during his arrest. It seems to me that his purpose was to demonstrate the appropriate Christian attitude toward an enemy–Jesus healed the enemy's ear.
4. John 15:14: It can definitely be unselfish for a person to risk his own life while trying to inflict lethal force on an attacker, if the defender was defending somebody else. But self-defense seems to me to be by definition selfish. The Christian self-defense advocates argue that it is legitimate self-defense, but I don't see that the passages you've cited support the idea that self-defense is ever appropriate for a Christian.
5. Exodus 22:2-3: Supposing that this passage says a person has a legal right to defend himself from attack, this doesn't mean that Christians should exercise that right. Consider the person who forces us to go one mile with him: we don't owe that person the second mile, but in the passage you cited from Matthew 5, Jesus tells us to do just that.
It seems to me the entire tenor of Jesus' Sermon on the Mount is inconsistent with Christian self-defense, and with military "defense" as well. That Norman Geisler and J. P. Moreland (I am more familiar with Moreland BTW and I have much respect for his ability as a philosopher) say it's immoral to apply pacifism in the "what if an intruder were threatening your family" case is interesting, but no more interesting than when you say the same thing. Your opinion is worth no less than theirs (or mine) and I don't consider their authority on such moral questions to be..well..authoritative.
your Friend
keith
PS I wonder if anyone else is following this debate. I'd be interested in hearing from some of our other friends
Supposing that this passage says a person has a legal right to defend himself from attack, this doesn't mean that Christians should exercise that right. Consider the person who forces us to go one mile with him: we don't owe that person the second mile, but in the passage you cited from Matthew 5, Jesus tells us to do just that.
True, I could forgo my rights out of compassion. However, the rules of pacifism and turning the other cheek apply for non-lethal threats, but I do not see them applying to the extent that we allow people to do us physical harm.
It still seems hard to square enemy-loving with enemy-killing, especially killing so-called enemies in war.
Principles such as this don't stand in isolation. I could equally say that "loving your wife" while allowing her to be raped does not seem like love – I would crack that rapist over the head with the hardest, heaviest item I could lift. Lovingly, of course ;). But you get my point. You must have balance, not one rule to make all decisions.
But self-defense seems to me to be by definition selfish.
Not necessarily. We are to be good stewards of all God has given us, including ourselves. And if I have children, protecting myself from an attacker also is loving them, because they need me for emotional and physical provision. Self-defense is not by definition selfish.
I believe that the pacifist view, and this view of self-defense, are errant in that they try to globally apply principles that only apply to personal, non-lethal, and non-physically harmful situations.
I think that, as you suggested, we may forgo the protection of ourselves and be godly about it, but we must balance this type of sacrifice with our responsibility as stewards of our selves and family.
I think that using these scriptures to promote pacifism is actually a stretch that ends up being heretical, in that it says what these passages do not say, and it steps on other principles which must be held in balance, and in some cases, in superiority to, these commands.
For example, I place "love my wife" over "love your enemy." You may not want to protect your wife when she is being raped, but my theology supports my establishment of righteousness with force in such a situation.
Hi Seeker:
Protecting your family from danger is important, no doubt, but is there no limit to what you can properly do to protect them? For example, would it be morally permissible to kill your neighbor’s children and steal their food if your children needed the food?
There is a large difference between self defense, and stealing or killing others in order to TAKE from them something that is not yours.
True, but my point is that IF there are things we ought not do even if they are needed to protect our family, then simply saying that X is needed to protect our family doesn’t refute a claim that we ought never do X.
Protecting your family and homeland is important, and because pacifism will not protect with lethal force, it will inevitably be conquered by evil. And I don’t think this position is biblical – we need a more developed view of such things.
If I didn’t believe in God that argument would be stronger, it seems to me.
Some points to consider in the defense of action, not pacifism
– “turn the other cheek” is not a global command to never use force. Note that Jesus consciously made a whip and chased out the money changers. And he was angry. Turn the other cheek refers to non-lethal threats – it has to do with suffering insult (which a slap on the cheek is). It may also include accepting physical attacks or martyrdom, but I doubt it means that under all conditions.
The passage doesn’t imply Jesus was hitting people with whip, I should note.
– “love your enemies” is a command to be kind and not hate, but does not mean that we should not defend ourselves
I still don’t see how you can be loving your enemy and killing him at the same time.
– as I said, conditions that do not involve immanent death can and should be dealt with using non-physical or non-lethal methods, but overly developed wicked nations and people need to be restrained, punished, or killed with force in order to protect others. I believe that my analogy of natural medicine v. surgery in treating diseases is a good one – if a disease is very far advanced, long-term methods will not work, even though they are desirable for many reasons.
You say that wicked nations (sometimes) need to be killed with force to protect others. You are entitled to your opinion, but like I said before, if I didn’t believe in God I might be more convinced by that claim. If God wants us to love our enemies (I believe he does) and IF loving them is not compatible with killing them (it seems difficult to square the two) then I will trust that God will take care of the rest.
(Snipping some stuff because we’d be treading the same ground; if you think I left something unaddressed please let me know)
And as head of my family government (see The Five Spheres of Government), I am responsible for protecting my family, and I take that seriously. It is my Christian duty to protect them – not retaliate after the fact, but protect them beforehand. Those who think we should all be willing to die for our faith when the next Muslim whacko comes to our house will probably die before me.
If the intruder were not a whacko, but a desperate sinner hoping to steal something, your family would be better off if you just let him take what he wants. Trying to kill him might back him into a corner, and that might mean somebody dies when no death was needed–that somebody could be you or your family.
No argument about protecting my family; skeptical that violence ever really protects them, especially the violence of war. The logic of war leads us to “deal with the devil”, which is why we aided Stalin in WW II, it’s why we aided the Shah of Iran in our struggle with Russia, Sadaam Hussein in his war against Iran, and why we aided the future Al Q’iada in their war against Russia. The logic of militarism leads us to make pacts with the “lesser evil” and so often it comes back to haunt us. It’s like taking just a little bit of crack cocaine to get us by—eventually we have to keep on taking it to prevent something even worse.
Have you seen the movies Sgt. York or the Mission? Both deal with passive v. active resistance.
I saw the Mission a long time ago but I can’t remember it. I was really annoyed by Sgt. York for this reason: the chaplin, unable to convince York with the Bible used a history book as a higher source. Frankly that seems a little but blasphemous.
Your Friend
Keith
"You may not want to protect your wife when she is being raped…"
"The Straw Man fallacy is committed when a person simply ignores a person's actual position and substitutes a distorted, exaggerated or misrepresented version of that position."
"PS I wonder if anyone else is following this debate. I'd be interested in hearing from some of our other friends"
I agree with you Keith. I think the Sermon on the Mount is central to Christianity. Jesus directly preached the Golden Rule to people. Seeker you should take heed. Jesus himself was non-violent. Isn't that what made his teaching so extraordinary, so radical, compared to the morality of his time? Seeker your approach to violence is the common one. It's also held by radical Islam. I think it's partly to blame for a lot of the condemnations heaped upon religion by secularists. All I know is that if everyone was a pacifist, it would be a much better world. Isn't that what Jesus wanted? To teach us love? But what do I know, I'm just a fool atheist according to Seeker.
Hi Cineaste:
I think the logic of war leads to just that kind of thinking–it's not just religious justifications for war either. What Al Q'aida has in common with all people who support war is the belief that their cause is so important it justifies killing people for it. If killing is permissible then why not deliberately kill civilians–we did it in Japan and Germany during WW II? Why not set up rape camps to demoralize the enemy? I know yuo wouldn't use this vocabulary, but it seems to me that once you've justified killing there is no limit to the kind of sinfulness you'd accept for the sake of winning the war.
your friend
keith
"Cin, you are totally mistaken, and I am tired of your logical fallacy of "guilt by association" with Islam."
Silly Seeker. Statements of fact should not be considered arguments. I said, "Seeker your approach to violence is the common one. It's also held by radical Islam." I too hold this approach to violence. I'm not a pacifist either. Do you accuse me of the guilt by association fallacy because I associated you to me? Come off of it.
"Seeker's rhetoric does sound similar to Uhl's."
Reply: "If you cant' see the difference, I don't have time to tell you now…"
When you can articulate the difference, let me know.
——————————————————-
Keith,
"…it seems to me that once you've justified killing there is no limit to the kind of sinfulness you'd accept for the sake of winning the war."
Again, I am in agreement with you. I don't believe in "sinfulness." I would use the word "immorality" instead. But yes, lethal force can be a slippery slope; used to justify ever increasingly radical means to justify an end.
Cin
What do you think Keith? Anyone can interpret scripture to suit them. Seeker's rhetoric does sound similar to Uhl's…Statements of fact should not be considered arguments…When you can articulate the difference, let me know.
I am practicing patience with the extra work you are making me do on this one. Truly, if you can't see the difference between my arguments and the justification that Uhl is using, you are not as smart as you pretend. However, since i do think you are smart, I am chalking it up to anti-religionist blindness that purposely and obtusely refuses to see the differences between pathogenic faith systems and healthy ones.
Just like you, in anti-religionist glee, can't keep yourself from comparing radical Muslims and evangelicals, you also can't help making such daft comparisons between me and any other crazies you find in the news. It's juvenile, non-intellectual, and borders on trolling.
I understand you think that you were making a statement of fact, but the differences seem so obvious to me that I think you are just being lazy.
But here you go. Hopefully you will start thinking in the future, instead of making such irreponsible comparisons.
Here's how Uhl's approach differs from the principles I have set out regarding pacifism and justice:
(a) Uhl is justifying vigilante justice, which the bible condemns.
(b) Uhl is using lethal force against people who are not making lethal threats
(c) Uhl is using methods that unnessecarily endanger innocent people
(d) Uhl is NOT acting in self-defense
(e) As far as I know, Phelps is not breaking any civil or biblical laws by protesting, even if his theology is whacked. I guess if you believe that blasphemy is punishable by death, you might want to kill them, but I have never suggested that. In fact, I am AGAINST blaspemy laws.
So, there you go. At least five significant ways that Uhl's illogic is different from the bibilcal principles I have outlined. His ideas sound NOTHING like mine.
HI Seeker: shouldn’t. What I was doing is questioning whether or not violence provides real protection. I was arguing that maybe we ought to trust God on this matter and not our own fears (ah..I can do the strawman too?:-)
You keep with the challenging responses? Because of the direction this is going I feel the need to make a point before I actually answer your post. Here it is:
1. There is a difference between (a) using violence to repel a violent intruder threatening your family and (b) the violence of warfare. The violent intruder is guilty of something and cannot properly expect that the people he’s threatening won’t react with their own violence. But generally speaking the enemy in war is just a person like you, who believes he is doing his duty to fight for his country the same way our soldiers think they are fighting for us. You previously objected when I spoke of taking food from another man’s starving family in order to feed our own family—you pointed out there is a difference between a criminal who intends to rape and an innocent neighbor. It seems to me that military force is pretty much just like the example I gave though—we kill the innocent because we believe it’s needed to protect our own. In a way, the discussion about the rapist or murderer distracts us from this issue.
2. And yet there is a theological issue that the distraction addresses and I do want to get into that. I used to call myself a “Type 2 Pacifist” (I made that up myself? What I meant was: I didn’t have a problem with using necessary violence against violent criminal attackers but I did object to the killing of the innocent that war entails. I wasn’t quite “all the way” pacifist. But in the last few weeks I have been reading some theology that has made me reconsider my half-hearted (ah…maybe it’s more like 82%) embrace of pacifism. This is where our discussion has wandered and I do want to address it just because of the theology involved.
So anyway…You wrote:
True, I could forgo my rights out of compassion. However, the rules of pacifism and turning the other cheek apply for non-lethal threats, but I do not see them applying to the extent that we allow people to do us physical harm.
I guess I am not seeing this as being about rules of any sort. It seems to me that Christ’s teaching on the Mount was aimed at getting us to see the world in the proper way, in the way that Christ saw it, seeing things through the sacrificial love of the cross. I think you agree that Christ taught exactly that kind of sacrificial love, our disagreement being about what kinds of actions follow from that love.
It still seems hard to square enemy-loving with enemy-killing, especially killing so-called enemies in war.
Principles such as this don’t stand in isolation. I could equally say that “loving your wife” while allowing her to be raped does not seem like love – I would crack that rapist over the head with the hardest, heaviest item I could lift. Lovingly, of course ;). But you get my point. You must have balance, not one rule to make all decisions.
Remembering that I am not claiming I would follow through with pacifism in the situation you described, still I am not sure I agree that there is a conflict between competing principles here. God said we are to love our enemies so I don’t see how we can properly make an exception. We are also supposed to love our wives, so I don’t see how we can make an exception there either. So why would God give us those two principles if there’s going to be a conflict? It seems to me that your view depends on the idea that God cannot protect our family from real harm? If we trust that God will take protect our family from real harm then we don’t have to worry about that horn of the dilemma, and we can do our part by practicing the enemy-love part. I should note that God’s protection doesn’t entail that the criminal will not be successful; God could be thinking longer term than that.
But self-defense seems to me to be by definition selfish.
Not necessarily. We are to be good stewards of all God has given us, including ourselves. And if I have children, protecting myself from an attacker also is loving them, because they need me for emotional and physical provision. Self-defense is not by definition selfish.
Well, maybe, but I know a lot of people who rationalize all kinds of bad behavior by similar arguments.
I believe that the pacifist view, and this view of self-defense, are errant in that they try to globally apply principles that only apply to personal, non-lethal, and non-physically harmful situations.
I think that, as you suggested, we may forgo the protection of ourselves and be godly about it, but we must balance this type of sacrifice with our responsibility as stewards of our selves and family.
Whatever balance we choose must be appropriate balance and I think we might need to remember that God is there to help us—we don’t have to give up one principle to protect another.
I think that using these scriptures to promote pacifism is actually a stretch that ends up being heretical, in that it says what these passages do not say, and it steps on other principles which must be held in balance, and in some cases, in superiority to, these commands
I don’t think I am guilty of the heresy you suggest, partly because I didn’t make the particular scriptural arguments you seemed to be objecting to. You do know that one can argue that the typical anti-pacifist reading of scripture is heresy, arguing that the anti-pacifists are trying to bend scripture like the Pharisees, straining at gnats to excuse ignoring Jesus’ clear words. Tossing around the heresy charge is something of a discussion stopper though.
For example, I place “love my wife” over “love your enemy.” You may not want to protect your wife when she is being raped, but my theology supports my establishment of righteousness with force in such a situation.
Cineaste already pointed out this strawman, friend Seeker. I never suggested not wanting to protect my wide, I never even argued that I
your friend
Keith