Nonresistance: Objections

First post: Nonresistance: A Personal Background
Previous post: Nonresistance: Conclusions (Part 2)

Our goal in this series has been to uncover what the Bible teaches about violence and nonresistance. We’ve surveyed the Old and New Testaments to see how its teachings unfold. Now, we’ll take one last look at how proponents of nonresistance support their position, and analyze their arguments in light of the Scriptures we’ve discussed already.

The Sermon on the Mount

There are basically three distinct passages used to support the doctrine of nonresistance. Their essence may be repeated in other places, but the arguments reduce to the Sermon on the Mount, Peter in Gethsemane, and the “swords-to-plowshares” prophecy in Isaiah.

Dean Taylor argues that the Sermon on the Mount represents a “radical change” from the Old Testament. He portrays Jesus as discarding the Mosaic Law “as if it were already centuries expired,” replacing it with his own “daring manifesto.”[1]

This is probably one of the best arguments that nonresistance has on its side. Some liberal theologians have tried to harmonize their view with the Old Testament by making all the violence and warfare out to be man’s fault, at odds with God’s desires, but a straightforward reading of the Bible easily debunks this hypothesis.

Dean’s argument acknowledges the violence of the Old Testament, and rather than trying to explain it away, suggests that it has been replaced by a new ethic. We believe the argument is flawed, but it nonetheless represents the best of the Biblical arguments on the subject.

If you’ve been reading through our series, you’ll likely recall our discussion of the Sermon on the Mount a few posts back. Dean’s argument hinges upon the premise that the laws Jesus was discarding were the Mosaic Laws that God had handed down on Mount Sinai. As we’ve seen, though, this is not the case – Jesus was repudiating the Pharisees’ “laws,” not God’s. He came, not to destroy God’s Law, but to fulfill it. Dean’s argument thus fails to accomplish what is claimed.

Peter in Gethsemane

The second key passage is found in Matthew 26:51–54. When Jesus is arrested in Gethsemane, Peter tries to take a stand and fend off the soldiers. Jesus stops him, and though He had the power to resist if He wanted to, He chooses to surrender Himself to the soldiers instead. The particular phrase that turns this passage into an argument for nonresistance is this: “For all who take the sword will perish by the sword.”

Dean Taylor quotes Tertullian, an early church father, as saying “…the Lord afterward, in disarming Peter, disarmed every soldier.” This was a “significant change” from “the way they did it in the Old Testament.”[1]

But as we discussed in the post above, it’s not at all clear that this was what Christ had in mind. When we take into account the fact that Christ’s “changes” to the Old Testament are not nearly as extensive as Dean alleged they were, there is little evidence to suggest that this one verse represents a wholesale rejection of the Old Testament’s teachings on violence.

Swords into Plowshares

The third and final key passage is found in Isaiah 2. Isaiah prophesies that a day will come when the nations will beat their swords into plowshares, and their spears into pruning-hooks. They would live in peace.

Some believed that this prophecy found its fulfillment in the Church today, in a people who do not learn war any more. This passage was quoted “time and time again,” Dean says, by early Christians, who believed that Christ had fulfilled this prophecy.

But as we’ve discussed before, this prophesied end of violence will appear when Christ returns – when He judges all the nations personally. Isaiah is referring to the Second Coming, not the First. Further prophecies in Revelations (to pick one example) confirm that Christ has not yet come in power to rule over all nations once and for all.

Final Thoughts

This series hasn’t quite turned out the way I expected when I started. As I look back over it, I’m not entirely sure how I feel about it.

If I were to write it again, I’d like to balance the discussion of violence with the Christian perspective of peace. I’m not satisfied with the somewhat lopsided nature of the presentation I’ve given.

I’d also like to engage the historical arguments for nonresistance. Sadly, I don’t have enough detailed knowledge of church history to be able to front much of a discussion at the moment.

Perhaps, Lord willing, we’ll revisit this topic again down the road.

In the mean time, how did you feel the series went? Did it leave you with any pressing questions?

Look over the other posts in this series at our Series Index.

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1. Dean Taylor, “A Change of Allegiance” (2008)  ↩

Nonresistance: Conclusions (Part 2)

First post: Nonresistance: A Personal Background
Previous post: Nonresistance: Conclusions (Part 1)

This post will close out the positive presentation of the Bible’s teachings on violence and mostly wrap up this series. We’ll probably have another post covering popular objections. If you have any you’ve heard or that occur to you while you’re reading, please feel free to leave them in the comments.

As mentioned in the last post, violence is a response to sin – either as a consequence for sin, or a defense against it. We elaborated on the first point in the last post; now we will turn our attention to the second.

Defense

The principle of defense in general is enshrined in Scripture, both the New and Old Testaments. We are told to defend the rights of the fatherless and widows (Proverbs 31:9). Paul defends himself in court on a few occasions (Acts 22, 26, etc.). Peter tells us to be ready to defend our faith (1 Peter 3:15). We’ve already recounted Abraham’s defense of his nephew Lot, and God’s blessing of it (Genesis 14). The Mosaic law provides specific regulations for self-defense (Exodus 22:2–3). In fact, the very first account of holy violence is a defense against sin – the flaming sword, set up to prevent mankind from defiling the sanctity of the Garden and stealing from the Tree of Life (Genesis 3:24).

So we see in Scripture examples of defense, both violent and non-violent. But what principles do we see governing the application of defense? When is defense appropriate, and to what degree?

Preventing Sin

A Biblical defense is a response to sin that aims at preventing sin with reasonable force.

It’s not a “pre-emptive strike,” an attack under the assumption that the other party is probably going to attack you soon. It’s a response to a realized situation – someone bringing you to court, breaking into your house, or in Lot’s case, attacking you and dragging you off to slavery. You have a good reason to believe that the offender is, presently, trying to sin against you (or someone else).

Further, it aims at preventing sin. No more, no less – an appropriate defense uses whatever means are permissible and necessary to prevent an offender from committing sin against someone else. It doesn’t aim to punish sin (which we discussed in the previous post).

(Note that this general definition goes for any kind of defense, not just a violent one. The appropriate defense will vary depending on the situation, but the principle is the same.)

Reasonable Force

So how do we determine what kind of defense is “appropriate”?

The Bible gives us case law to illustrate a general principle in Exodus 22:2–3. If a thief is caught breaking into a home at night, and the homeowner strikes him and kills him, the homeowner is not guilty – but if it happens during the day, the homeowner is guilty.

Why? During the day, the homeowner can see the thief and gauge his intentions. He’s just stealing his goods, not trying to kill him. At night, you’ve got someone creeping into your house – as far as you know, he could be there to kill you, or your family. A more violent response is therefore permitted.

The general principle, we deduce, is that the response to sin should be reasonable for the offense being committed. Killing to prevent a theft is not a reasonable response. Abraham’s response, mounting a rescue mission to save the lives of Lot and his family, was reasonable.

This distinction is preserved in the legal doctrine of “reasonable force.” [1] We have the right to defend ourselves with as much force as we believe is reasonably necessary to protect ourselves or our property.

Closing Remarks

We’ve taken our time working through the Biblical texts, trying to establish a reasonably complete picture of the Bible’s teachings on these important topics. Though we haven’t covered every single applicable passage, the tenor of the Bible’s teachings should be clear.

If you believe there are some passages that we haven’t sufficiently taken into account, or if you have other objections to our conclusions, please leave a comment. We’ll be happy to look at it and address it specifically.

Next post: Nonresistance: Objections

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1. http://definitions.uslegal.com/r/reasonable-force/  ↩

Nonresistance: Conclusions (Part 1)

First post: Nonresistance: A Personal Background
Previous post: Nonresistance: A Biblical Theology of Violence (Part 6)

Violence is, in essence, a response to sin. God gives us two patterns of response in Scripture: Violence can be a consequence for sin; and violence can be a defense against sin. In this post we’ll consider the first case, and we’ll follow with the second case in a (hopefully) timely manner.

Retribution

The Bible’s teaching on retribution is simple:

• Vengeance belongs to God alone, not to us as individuals (Deuteronomy 32:35).
• God has chosen governments to be His agents to execute that vengeance on earth (Romans 13:4).
• This vengeance is to be proportionate to the offense committed (Exodus 21:24, Leviticus 24,:20 Deuteronomy 19:21).

This is the basic foundation of retributive justice. In this context, violence is given as the moral duty of the government, as an agent of God’s justice. But there are limits given, within which the violence is permissible – outside of those limits, the violence becomes unjust and wrong.

Due Process

Retribution cannot be dished out willy-nilly at the whim of whoever happens to be in charge. For a punishment to be meted out, a plurality of witnesses must testify against the accused. One person (or, in the case of modern forensic evidence, one thread of evidence) cannot condemn a person to judgment (Numbers 35:30).

Further, the government officials are to investigate the matter and examine the witnesses thoroughly (Deuteronomy 19:18). False witnesses are to be dealt with severely – they are to be given the punishment they wanted to give the accused (Deuteronomy 19:19).

Proportional Punishment

“Let the punishment fit the crime.” This is a basic principle of Biblical retributive justice. The severity of the punishment should match the severity of the crime. In Biblical terms, “life for life, eye for eye, tooth for tooth.”

That’s not to say that punishments must be exactly the same as the crime. Alternative fair punishments, such as fines, may also be viable options (Deuteronomy 22:19). The specific equivalence of the punishment is left up to the discretion of the judges.

Authority

Governments have been given the authority of life and death, symbolized by the sword (Romans 13:4). This applies both to their own citizens and to foreigners in their land (Deuteronomy 24:17).

Individuals acting without this authority are guilty of criminal violence. Only individuals acting in a capacity as an official of the government – whether they be police, soldiers, judges, Congressmen, presidents, or kings – can have this authority. This means that the Bible condemns “vigilante justice,” individuals taking the law into their own hands to right perceived wrongs.

But as we’ve seen, there is no concept in the Bible that it is inherently wrong for someone (Christian or otherwise) to act in the capacity as an official of the government.

Next post: Nonresistance: Conclusions (Part 2)

In the next post, we’ll finish up our summary with the second case – violence as a defense against sin. In the mean time, are we missing any important Scriptural passages that impact our conclusions?

Nonresistance: A Biblical Theology of Violence (Part 6)

First post: Nonresistance: A Personal Background
Previous post: Nonresistance: A Biblical Theology of Violence (Part 5)

This post represents the last installment in the Biblical Theology segment of our study on nonresistance. We’ll finish up the New Testament here, then begin systematically defining what our survey has uncovered.

Persecution

There may seem to be one last holdout for nonresistance – their champions, as it were, the Christians persecuted and put to death through the ages. The Anabaptists in particular have one hero they march out regularly.

Dirk Willems, an Anabaptist in the Netherlands, was imprisoned in the 1500s for his beliefs. He managed to escape, but was noticed and pursued by a guard. During the chase, Dirk successfully crossed a frozen river. The guard, being somewhat heavier, was not so lucky and broke through the thin ice. On seeing his plight, Dirk returned to pull the man out and save his life, and was recaptured and eventually executed as a result.

There are other examples in church history; Fox’s Book of Martyrs lists hundreds of Christians who gave their lives for the sake of the Gospel. And there are many scriptures which tell Christians how to respond to persecution; none of them suggest that violence might be appropriate. So is persecution a situation where violence is forbidden?

To answer that question, we’ll have to consider three different kinds of persecution. There is “non-violent persecution,” where Christians are persecuted by being called names, slandered, or boycotted for their beliefs; there is “vigilante persecution,” where an individual takes it upon himself to kill Christians for their beliefs; and there is “state-sanctioned persecution,” where the government organizes or supports either violent or non-violent persecution.

In the first case, of non-violent persecution, violence in response seems completely unwarranted. Scripture gives numerous clear, specific teachings that we ought not to avenge ourselves, but that we ought to bless those who slander us (see, for example, 1 Peter 3). “Do not return evil for evil” is taught in both the New and Old Testaments.

There are no specific Scriptures which address the case of individuals trying to execute Christians. This second type of case is exceptionally rare, usually reserved for lone nuts or extremists. And as with the first case, barring evidence to the contrary, there’s no reason to think that the Bible’s teachings on personal self-defense in this manner have been changed. It’s appropriate to use legal means to protect one’s life or the life of others.

The third case is historically very common. It can be seen dozens of time in the Bible, from the Jewish government executing Stephen, to the Roman government imprisoning Paul, and even the death of Jesus Himself. The book of Revelations is full of examples. So what does the Bible teach us to do here? Here are a few observations.

Note, first, that this doesn’t fall under the purview of ordinary self-defense, since it is the state rather than an individual that is killing Christians. Violence on a personal level doesn’t stop the aggression. (The question of an organized uprising is, for the moment, outside the scope of this discussion.)

Instead, Jesus tells his disciples that when they are persecuted in one city, they should flee to another; in the book of Revelations, He calls for patience and endurance. When a hostile government rises up to persecute the Church, we ought to rejoice that He has called us to share in His suffering (1 Peter 3). When we have legal recourse, we can again use that, as Paul did (Acts 22). These are all appropriate responses to state-sanctioned persecution.

The State

Thus far, we have established much of what the New Testament does not say on the subject of violence and government. What, then, does it have to say?

There are a few passages that speak to the issue. By and large, the New Testament seems content with the Old Testament’s coverage, but there is one area in particular that has changed – the Christian’s relation to his government.

In the Old Testament, as far as the children of God were concerned, there was one government: theocratic Israel. They were from time to time taken captive by one nation or another, but their normative state was an independent nation, subject only to God’s special laws and regulations.

In the New Testament, the children of God are no longer one nation but many. Rather than flying a single theocratic flag, Christians are spread throughout the nations, often as subjects of a heathen ruler. The New Testament reflects this change when it gives us new guidelines for living in a political kingdom that is not God’s.

Render unto Caesar the things that are Caesar’s; but render unto God the things that are God’s.
Matthew 22:21

Romans 13 tells us to be subject to the ruling authorities, and to render to them their due – taxes, revenue, honor, and respect. The Church is no longer a political nation; it is people from every nation. As such, we have the responsibility to be good citizens in whatever nation we reside.

Their authority is given to them by God, so as long as they are acting within that authority, we are bound to obey them. If they command us to disobey God, of course, they are overstepping their authority, and in those cases we ought to obey God rather than man (Acts 5:29). In most cases governments will promote righteousness and punish wickedness, as they should. When they don’t, and they begin to punish the righteous, we ought to rejoice in sharing Christ’s suffering, as discussed above.

This concludes our survey of the Bible’s development of its teachings on violence and government; in the next post, we’ll work on laying out a concise summary of the Bible’s teachings. After that we’ll take a post or two to address some objections that arise, and then wrap up the series.

Next post: Nonresistance: Conclusions (Part 1)

How would you summarize what we’ve seen in the past six posts? Leave a comment!

Nonresistance: A Biblical Theology of Violence (Part 5)

First post: Nonresistance: A Personal Background
Previous post: Nonresistance: A Biblical Theology of Violence (Part 4)

Having finished our survey of the Old Testament, we turn our attention to the New Testament. We will finish it up in one more post, and then work on a systematic description of what we’ve learned.

The Sermon on the Mount

For most Christian pacifists or proponents of nonresistance, the Sermon on the Mount is the immediate “go-to” passage to explain their position. They herald Jesus’ teachings in Matthew 5:17–48 as a “daring manifesto” in which Jesus changed the commandments of the Torah.

Dean Taylor, for example, writes “Jesus’ radical call to nonresistance, loving our enemies, and even doing good to those who mistreat us seemed diametrically to contradict the idea of God being a warrior.”[1] He couldn’t reconcile the teachings of Jesus in Matthew 5 with the ethic given in the Old Testament.

But this poses a larger problem for him than he thinks. Among the things he has trouble reconciling with the God of the Old Testament are “loving our enemies” and “doing good to those who mistreat us.” But isn’t that exactly what the Old Testament teaches? Let’s look again:

Do not rejoice when your enemy falls,
and let not your heart be glad when he stumbles,
lest the Lord see it and be displeased,
and turn away his anger from him.
Proverbs 24:17–18

If your enemy is hungry, give him bread to eat,
and if he is thirsty, give him water to drink,
for you will heap burning coals on his head,
and the Lord will reward you.
Proverbs 25:21–22

It seems the concepts Dean has trouble reconciling with the God of the Old Testament are found in the Old Testament. Instead of jumping to the conclusion that Jesus was “incontestably making significant changes in lifestyle” in this area, perhaps Dean would do better to spend a little more time reconciling these teachings in the Old Testament. He would then be better equipped to answer the question of how Jesus’ teachings relate to the Old Testament.

And, having done so in the last few posts, let us ask the question ourselves: Is Jesus teaching different principles than are found in the Old Testament? Does the Old Testament look favorably upon anger, lust, or returning evil for evil? To the contrary, the Old Testament is in agreement with Jesus’ teachings. So to what was Jesus referring when He said “You have heard that it has been said”?

Let’s go back up to the beginning of the passage. The thesis, the premise Jesus expounds upon in this section, is to be found in verse 20: “unless your righteousness exceeds that of the scribes and Pharisees, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven.” In many other contexts, we learn that the teachers of Israel – the scribes and Pharisees – had taken it upon themselves to “soften” the Law, to make it apply to the visible parts of their lives while saying nothing of their hearts.

So when the Pharisees say “You shall not murder,” they left it at that – they said nothing of the heart attitudes, the anger that was the root of murder. When they say “You shall not commit adultery,” they mean only the physical act – lusting after a beautiful woman was fair game. Jesus continues down through this passage, giving examples where the righteousness of the scribes and Pharisees fell short of the righteousness of the Law.

As if to seal this interpretation as the correct one, again at the head of the passage, we find Jesus’ promise: “I have not come to destroy the Law or the Prophets, but to fulfill them.” Jesus doesn’t change the Law or the Prophets; He reaffirms them.

Peter’s Sword

Gethsemane may be the second most popular prooftext for nonresistance. When the soldiers arrived to take Jesus away, Peter drew his sword (which Jesus had directed him to purchase) and struck out to defend his master. Jesus rebuked him and told him to put his sword away, so that the prophecies of His life and death would be fulfilled.

In Matthew’s gospel, Jesus also gives another reason for His command: “all who take the sword will perish by the sword.” Dean Taylor quotes from Tertullian: “The Lord… in disarming Peter, disarmed every soldier.” They take Jesus’ command as a general principle, forbidding Christians everywhere to take up the sword. But it’s far from clear that this is what Jesus intended.

First, as has already been observed, Jesus’ main reason – the one given in the other gospels – is that He chose to submit to His captors willingly, and was telling Peter so. He had the ability to summon legions of angels in His defense, but opted not to.

Second, this reason isn’t given as a moral imperative; it doesn’t forbid violence per se. It merely says that those who wield the sword will (generally) die by the sword. Their occupation is by definition more hazardous than, say, farming. Rather than a moral imperative, this could be Jesus showing his care for Peter’s well-being.

Given the lack of supporting passages elsewhere, it hardly seems plausible to construe a general prohibition on soldiery from this one verse.

These are the two primary passages that come up in the discussion of nonresistance. For the sake of space, we’ll pause here and finish up with the rest of the New Testament passages in the next post. Stay tuned!

Next post: Nonresistance: A Biblical Theology of Violence (Part 6)

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1. Dean Taylor, “A Change of Allegiance”. Radical Reformation Books (2008)  ↩

Nonresistance: A Biblical Theology of Violence (Part 4)

First post: Nonresistance: A Personal Background
Previous post: Nonresistance: A Biblical Theology of Violence (Part 3)

I’m going to try to pick up the pace a bit and finish out the Biblical theology section. We’ll finish up the Old Testament in this installment, and then come back for a couple posts covering the teachings of Jesus and the apostles. After that, we’ll be ready to go back and summarize what the Bible says for us today about violence and self-defense.

Wisdom Literature

“Wisdom literature” generally encompasses Psalms, Proverbs, and Ecclesiastes. As you probably already know, David and Solomon both contributed heavily to the Psalms and Proverbs (though they weren’t the only ones). And, as part of God’s inspired word, these are more than just their opinions or journal entries. They’re given for our edification. So there are a couple more or less related things we will pull out from these books before we finish up the Old Testament.

In the Psalms, we see cries for justice. Sometimes referred to as imprecatory Psalms, we have examples of the Psalmist praying for salvation from and judgment on those who persecute him. See, for example, Psalm 69.

But in Proverbs, we seem to see something contradictory – passages that tell us to care for our enemies, give them food or drink when they are in need, and not to rejoice when they fall. Why the difference?

The key is that the imprecatory Psalms aren’t praying for judgment for the sake of personal vengeance, against a personal enemy. The Psalmist begs for deliverance from the enemies of God so that those who see it will glorify God and trust in His saving hand. By contrast, Proverbs is telling us how to relate on a personal level to our personal enemies – those who have wronged us, but are not necessarily making themselves enemies of the Gospel.

There really is no conflict between the imprecatory Psalms and the teachings of Proverbs; they merely apply to different situations. As Ecclesiastes says, there is a time to kill, and a time to heal; a time for war, and a time for peace. Part of discerning the Biblical theology of violence is being able to differentiate between those situations. We will spend more time later defining those differences more specifically.

The Prophets

Israel was growing tired of the seemingly constant warfare with their enemies. Sometimes a strong king would rise up who would cause God’s law to be kept in the land, and it would prosper for a time; then an evil king would come into power, and Israel’s enemies would return again. But through the din, God’s prophets carried a thread of hope: There will be a time when God causes wars to cease. The Lord Himself will judge between nations, and decide disputes; His Law will prevail, and there will be no need for warfare any more.

Warfare is essentially a fight against evil. It is necessary, in this life, while evil prevails; but it is only temporary. Violence will, ultimately, come to an end as evil’s influence on creation does. This is the hope that we look forward to.

But in the mean time, violence remains a part of life. Governments use violence as part of their God-ordained role in maintaining justice. This is why, when soldiers came to John the Baptist, he commanded them to be just in their dealings: “Do not extort money from anyone by threats or by false accusation, and be content with your wages.” He didn’t command them to give up violence, or to quit being a soldier; even though they worked under the command of a heathen emperor[1], their position was still a legitimate one.

We will be moving on to the New Testament in the next post. In the mean time, I’d like to ask a favor. I will probably be doing a post on objections down the road, so as you’re reading through this and my other posts, feel free to leave comments with any objections you come up with. Don’t worry if they aren’t well thought out or particularly deep. If it occurred to you, it’ll likely occur to someone else as well, and I can evaluate them and perhaps explain them better in the future.

Next post: Nonresistance: A Biblical Theology of Violence (Part 5)

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1. Whether the soldiers were Roman or Jewish, the Roman occupation meant they were ultimately under the authority of and answerable to the Roman emperor.  ↩

Nonresistance: A Biblical Theology of Violence (Part 3)

First post: Nonresistance: A Personal Background
Previous post: Nonresistance: A Biblical Theology of Violence (Part 2)

In the last post, we left off as Israel was marching on the Promised Land. God promised to scatter their foes before them, but required them to destroy the inhabitants of the land and the idols they worshipped. And they did, in some cases, but left the job unfinished in others. The idol-worship that remained would return to haunt them over and over again.

The Judges

In the years after the initial conquest of the Promised Land, God let several of the surrounding nations, enemies of Israel, continue to exist rather than destroying them completely. Judges 3 tells us that he did this for two reasons: To teach warfare, to those of the Israelites who hadn’t experienced it; and to test Israel, to see whether they would obey His commandments.

They flopped that test royally.

Over and over again, as soon as their guiding influence passed away, the Israelites fell into idolatry almost immediately. They’d incur the wrath of God; He’d deliver them into the hands of their enemies as He promised; they’d beg Him for deliverance; and He’d raise up a deliverer, who would free them from their captors and then act as judge over the Israelites, leading them back to worshipping the true God. And throughout his lifetime, the land would have peace.

Then he’d pass away, and in the leadership vacuum that followed, the Israelites would go right back to the idols of the lands around them. Without some stable form of government, “every man did that which was right in his own eyes,” and anarchy prevailed.

At one point in this cycle, one man opted to break the tradition and crown himself king. Through cunning and bloodshed, Gideon’s son Abimelech murdered his way to the throne. Despite wiser counsel to the contrary, the leaders of Shechem set him up as their king. They thought he would protect them from the other nations around them, but he ended up being far worse. When things got out of hand, they tried to stage a rebellion, but he had grown too powerful; he destroyed Shechem before being killed himself during his next siege.

Thus, the Bible says, God “returned the evil” of Abimelech and Shechem upon themselves. Abimelech had slaughtered seventy of his relatives to secure his right to rule; Shechem chose to exalt that violence, flaunt God’s law, and set a mass murderer up as their leader. Both suffered the consequences.

You see, the problem wasn’t that they wanted a king; God had made provisions for a king in His law. The problem was that they wanted someone other than God to protect them from the nations around them.

Most people can probably relate to the feeling of wanting something secure and visible that they can rely on – a steady job, a well-funded savings account, even solid leadership in their country. There’s nothing wrong with any of those things. But when we put our trust in those instead of God, we slight His grace and love in providing and taking care of us.

That’s what Shechem did, when it crowned Abimelech king. It’s also what the rest of the nation of Israel did again, years later, when they came together to beg the prophet Samuel for a king.

The Kings

Saul, a promising (if unconfident) young man from the tribe of Benjamin, was the first person to be crowned king of Israel with the blessing and authority of God. At His direction, Samuel selected Saul from among the people of Israel and anointed him king. And at first, Saul showed great promise, leading Israel to a great martial victory in defense of Jabesh-Gilead. His early detractors were silenced, and Saul mustered an army to rout the Philistines.

Things went well at first, but Saul began to crack under the pressure. Desperate to put on a good face for the peoples’ sake, he fudged the Lord’s commands a bit to make a good impression. But God was not happy. Because of Saul’s rebellion, God rejected him as king and selected a new king, also of humble origins – David, a local shepherd.

Unlike Saul, David was a “man after God’s own heart.” He was concerned with doing the right thing and honoring God above all else. He was a man like any of us, prone to sin – some especially egregious – but his heart was for God and His glory, and he always turned back to Him. God blessed him for his devotion. David ushered in an age of peace for the land of Israel that lasted for many years, and his legacy eventually found fulfillment in the birth of Christ, the High King of Kings.

It is interesting, then, that God told him he was not to build His temple on the grounds that he was a man of war. David’s wars were God’s wars, driving out the enemies of Israel as God had commanded; he was a great man of God, and his desire to build God a house was a testament to his true heart. But God desired that His temple be built by “a man of rest,” and gave that task to David’s son Solomon.

If David was fighting at God’s behest, waging a holy and righteous war, why did that disqualify him from building God’s Temple?

I will step back at this point and make a disclaimer; I’ve spent some time puzzling over this point and have not fully settled the reasons in my own mind. They don’t seem to be explicitly laid out in Scripture. I’ve decided to go ahead and publish this post without coming to a definite conclusion on this point, because I don’t believe it will affect my thesis dramatically one way or the other. If you believe I’m mistaken, by all means leave a comment; I’d love to hear some interpretations of this that make sense.

Because there is one thing that we can establish for certain: God does command Israel to wipe out their enemies, and blesses David for doing so. The fact that David was turned down for being a “man of war” doesn’t mean that God was displeased with him. God’s desire to have His temple built by a man of peace may have simply been symbolic, a reflection of the nature of His church. Whatever the true significance is, we have clear Scriptural testimony that God was not displeased with David for being a man of war.

Next post: Nonresistance: A Biblical Theology of Violence (Part 4)

Nonresistance: A Biblical Theology of Violence (Part 2)

First post: Nonresistance: A Personal Background
Previous post: Nonresistance: A Biblical Theology of Violence (Part 1)

In the last post, we began our survey of the Bible’s teachings on violence in Genesis, starting with God’s interactions with Adam and Noah and finishing out with a survey of the life of Abraham. In this post, we’ll pick up a few generations later with his descendants, who are now living in Egypt.

Israel in Egypt

The Israelites were originally under the protection of their kinsman Joseph, the Pharaoh’s prime minister, but after his death their relationship with the ruling family degraded rapidly. A Pharaoh came into power who felt no responsibility towards Joseph’s relations; threatened by their blooming prosperity, he resolved to control the Israelites by rounding them up for slave labor.

But God had other plans for the Israelites. He set about doing the impossible – taking a populace, completely broken and spiritless from years of slavery, and leading them to rebel against their taskmasters and march out of Egypt to freedom. But more than that, He was about to create a new nation from these pitiful refugees, a nation like no other.

The Israelites were in no shape to mount a rebellion on their own. They were doing their best to just survive and avoid the attention of their oppressors. When Moses appeared to lead them to freedom, the Israelites went along with it until Pharaoh increased their quotas in retaliation. Then the leaders turned on Moses. The Egyptians had broken their will to escape.

God’s plan was not so easily thwarted. He brought a series of plagues down on Egypt, the punishment getting worse and worse until the Egyptians begged the Israelites to leave. They gave them silver, gold, even their clothes – anything to get them out of the land before the plagues destroyed Egypt completely. When Pharaoh abruptly changed his mind and pursued the Israelites with his army, God wiped them off the map. It was an unprecedented victory.

But the people were still in no shape for war; years of oppression were not so easily wiped away. For the first part of their journey, God led them around via the wilderness, avoiding the land of the Philistines where they might be deterred by the threat of warfare. In the wilderness, He begins to unfold His plans to them.

The Chosen People

God revealed His Covenant and laws for the Israelites on Mount Sinai. He was creating a nation, complete with its own government and laws. Israel would be a paragon of justice, a model that all the nations in the world could look to (see Deuteronomy 4:6–8).

These laws included several that were punishable by death – murder (with exceptions for involuntary manslaughter or self-defense), kidnapping, abuse of parents, reckless endangerment resulting in death, and so forth. There were many punishments less than death – the so-called “lex talionis”, or “an eye for an eye,” required a punishment equal to the injury inflicted by the aggressor. Other crimes were punishable by a fine, or restoration of goods.

But the laws that God laid down weren’t just concerned with social justice. In fact, Jesus later summarized them like this:

”You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the great and first commandment. And a second is like it: You shall love your neighbor as yourself. On these two commandments depend all the Law and the Prophets.”

This will be crucial to the discussion later on. Some proponents of nonresistance portray the Mosaic Law as a harsh, unfeeling “law of justice,” as opposed to the gentler, kinder “law of love” that Christ introduces in the New Testament. This is, I think, a simple misunderstanding of the Mosaic Law. We’ll get into more details on the way Christ dealt with the Mosaic Law, and the distinctions within the Law itself, but for now, it will suffice to say this – the Mosaic Law shows us how we ought to love God, and how we ought to love our neighbor as ourself.

Holy War

In addition to the laws of self-governance that God established, He also gave them strict guidelines for warfare – both when invading and conquering the Promised Land, and when dealing with other enemies afterwards. Sometimes referred to as “holy war,” the conquest of the Promised Land was a unique instance in the history of warfare, when God commanded a particular people group to invade and utterly destroy the nations in a particular area. No mercy was to be given; everyone, from the men and women down to the flocks and herds, were to be summarily executed. There was to be no remnant of the idol-worshipping nations left to tempt the nation into disobedience.

God promised that, as long as the Israelites obeyed His commands, He would bless them and drive their enemies out before them. Not only would He give the Israelites great strength and prowess in battle, but He would turn the land itself against the Canaanites, using wild beasts and hornets to drive them out ahead of the invading Israelites. But they had to destroy every remnant of their idol worship.

As we know from the history recorded for us in Scripture, Israel was more or less faithful about this. Sometimes, in fits of jealousy for God’s holiness, they would destroy all idol-worshippers as He commanded, even those Israelites who had fallen prey to the charms of their enemies; other times, they were lax in their obedience, and allowed the temptation to persist – always to their downfall. But little by little, they began to conquer the Promised Land that God was giving them.

As they settled in, new temptations arose, and old ones returned. The gods that their fathers failed to completely destroy became the downfall of their children, and generations would arise that would follow the gods of the land instead of the true God. As He had sworn, God punished them by delivering them into the hands of their enemies. But they were still His chosen people, and he wouldn’t leave them to their fate. He raised up judges to lead them out from the rule of their enemies and from their idolatry.

But that’s a story for the next post.

Next post: Nonresistance: A Biblical Theology of Violence (Part 3)

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Nonresistance: A Biblical Theology of Violence (Part 1)

First post: Nonresistance: A Personal Background
Previous post: Nonresistance: Setting the Stakes

Rather than diving headlong into a systematic analysis of what the Bible teaches, we’re going to begin this study by taking a broad view of how the Bible’s teachings on violence unfold from the very beginning to the end of time. This will give us the foundation we need to formulate its teachings systematically.

In The Beginning

So follow me, if you will, to the beginning of time – the book of Genesis. Where does violence first enter the world God created?

If you said “Cain and Abel,” you were close. But it turns out that violence goes back even earlier. When Adam and Eve were banished from the Garden of Eden, God placed cherubim with a flaming sword at the gate to protect the tree of life. Violence was established in a very real sense for Adam and Eve as the punishment for transgression.

But that right belonged to God alone. When Cain slew his brother Abel, God set a mark on his head to prevent others from taking revenge. He had not yet given the authority to man to punish wrongdoing with violence. And the antediluvian society reflected this lack of established self-government.

Genesis 6 says that, in those days, “the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and every intention of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually.” Humanity was corrupt and plagued with violence, so much so that the Lord “regretted that he had made man.” But there was one man who found favor in God’s sight, and He gave humanity a fresh start. Through Noah, God preserved a remnant of His creation and destroyed the earth with a flood.

Having shown the depths of human depravity in allowing sin to persist before the Flood, God now instituted a new rule to restrain that depravity.

The Dominion Mandate

In Genesis 9, God commands Noah and his family to repopulate the new world. He gives them dominion over everything in the natural world – the beasts, birds, and fish are now a food source. In addition, He establishes a basic system of self-governance:

“Whoever sheds the blood of man,
by man shall his blood be shed,
for God made man in his own image.”
Genesis 9:6 (ESV)

Here God institutes the first death penalty, for the crime of murder. Those who kill another human being are to be executed for their offense, because man is made in the image of God.

It is no coincidence that the first kingdoms began to form not long afterwards. In Genesis 10 we read of Nimrod, a mighty hunter, who started in Babel and went on to build the foundations of the Assyrian empire. Other descendants of Noah and his sons settled in different directions, claiming land and building their own unique governments and cultures.

For some time the record of God’s intervention is silent, as the nations spread and populated the earth and did their own thing. Then He called Abram.

Abraham

Abram traveled at the Lord’s direction, looking for a place to call home. On his journey, he had to deal with conflict both from the nations he passed through and from those he traveled with. He handled these conflicts in different ways, some more mature than others. Here, we will review some of his successes.

Early in his travels, Abram faced conflict between his servants and those of his nephew Lot. To resolve this conflict, Abram offered a peaceable compromise, separating and giving Lot the choice of the land. God was with Abram, and after Lot made his choice He revealed to Abram that he would inherit all the land around him.

Some time passed, and several local kings declared war on several other local kings. Abram’s nephew Lot and his family were caught up in the scuffle and carried off as captives. When Abram heard the news, he armed his servants, gathered his own allies, and mounted a rescue mission, successfully defeating the other army and freeing his nephew. The people he freed, and of the spoils of Sodom and the other cities – which were rightfully his – he kept only his own expenses. He wasn’t in it for the money. But what’s especially interesting about this encounter is the appearance of Melchizedek, the king of Salem, and priest of God, who comes forward to pronounce God’s blessing on Abram. God had looked with favor on Abram’s rescue, and delivered his enemies into his hand.

God looked so favorably on Abram, in fact, that when He set about destroying Sodom and Gomorrah, He saw fit to bring Abram (now Abraham) in on his plans. Abraham interceded with Him on their behalf, begging Him to spare the cities if He could find so many as ten righteous people there. Abraham could recognize the wickedness of the cities – he refused the king of Sodom’s offer of the spoils of war, because he didn’t want to be made rich by him – but he wanted to see the cities have a second chance at righteousness. Unfortunately, as we know, that didn’t happen; there was only one man worth saving to be found in both cities, and they were destroyed as God had promised.

What do we see from these snapshots of Abraham’s life? A generous man whose first desire was for peace, who wanted to see God’s goodness prevail, who wasn’t willing to compromise his integrity, and at the same time was willing and ready to rise up and defend his family. Abraham wasn’t perfect, as other stories from his life show, but in his successes he is still be a role model for us today.

For the sake of space, I’m going to wrap up this post here. We’ll pick back up again with Moses, as the children of Israel take their first steps towards the Promised Land.

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Next post: Nonresistance: A Biblical Theology of Violence (Part 2)