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(Much attention has been given to the conservative Christian movement that has been occuring in the US Military since the Afghanistan and Iraq Wars began. A significant percentage of our troops believe that they are engaged in a “holy war” against the evil threat of Islam. Consider this piece an antidote to this troubling evangelical persepctive. In this excerpt from “A Practical Christian Pacifism,” David A. Hoekema describes two much more traditional and intellectually-grounded Christian approaches to the reality of war.)
I have grown increasingly dissatisfied with the gulf separating pacifists from defenders of just war. The church in which I was raised, the Christian Reformed Church, is what one draft board, in refusing a friend’s request to be recognized as a conscientious objector during the Vietnam war, aptly termed a “war church.” Calvinist theology has long been hostile to pacifism, and most Reformed churches’ reflections on war begin by distinguishing justified from unjustified wars. Yet the Reformed perspectives on the nature of the person and of society can actually support a realistic form of pacifism—a version that has received too little attention in either the “peace churches” or the “war churches.”
Pacifism need not be politically naive, nor need it place undue faith in human goodness. These may be telling objections to some pacifists, but a careful articulation of the pacifist vision can meet them. By the same token, pacifists ought not deride just-war theory as merely Realpolitik in vestments, for the just-war tradition, when taken seriously, is just as stringent in its demands as is pacifism.
The case for Christian pacifism has been made frequently and fervently by many writers. The Gospel writers record that Jesus called his followers to a way of life in which violence and division are overcome by sacrificial love. We must not return evil for evil, Jesus taught, but must return good for evil; we must not hate those who wrong us but must love our enemies and give freely to those who hate us. These themes in Jesus’ ministry were deeply rooted in the Hebrew prophetic tradition, and Jesus’ ministry an his sacrificial death were a continuation and a fulfillment of that tradition. Followers of Jesus, Christian pacifists say, must follow both his example and his teachings: they must show love for all in their actions and seek healing and reconciliation in every situation.
The early Christian community understood Jesus’ commands to prohibit the bearing of arms. Christians refused to join the military, even though the Roman army of the period was as much a police force as a conquering army. Those who converted to Christianity while in military service were instructed to refrain from killing, to pray for forgiveness for past acts of violence, and to seek release from their military obligations.
A profound change in the Christian attitude toward war occurred at the time of the emperor Constantine, whose conversion to Christianity helped bring the Christian community from the fringes to the center of Western society. From the time of Constantine to the present, pacifism has been a minority view in the Christian church. The just-war tradition, rooted in the ethical theories of Plato and Cicero and formulated within the Christian tradition by Augustine, Aquinas and the Protestant Reformers, defends military force as a last resort against grave injustice. According to this view, when the innocent are threatened by an unjust aggressor and all other remedies have failed, Jesus’ demand for sacrificial love may require us to use lethal force.
Pacifism and just-war theory reach different conclusions only in a narrow range of cases: both positions insist that Christians must strive always for healing and reconciliation and must act out of love for all, and both traditions unequivocally condemn the reasons—whether nationalism, territorial or economic gain, revenge or glory—for which nearly all wars have been fought. Yet the differences that exist are both theologically and politically significant.
Just-war defenders argue that if all means short of violence have failed and organized violence promises to be a limited and effective means of reestablishing justice, Christians may participate in war. Pacifists insist that to resort to warfare, even for a moral end, is to adopt a means inconsistent with the Christian’s calling.
11 Comments
So in essence, looked at historically, the just-war belief is a descendant of Greek philosophers, rather than Christian theology? It seems like “original Christianity”- do note the quotation marks- was rather strictly pacifist.
I believe a person has a right to defend himself, but I don’t believe anyone should join the military. Let’s face it- it is no longer a means to defend this nation, but a tool to support foreign wars. It lost itself somewhere along the way… There are many who still hold to its original designation, and I support them, but as it stands, the military is a tool of insane religious rhetoric and blood for oil programs. Money and madness.
At one time, there was a two year limit on a standing army in the US. Jefferson had lots to say on the dangers of having a standing army. It most certainly is not used to defend the US. When looking at the true history of all wars since the Spanish War, it never was.
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“There shall be no standing army but in time of actual war.” –Thomas Jefferson: Draft Virginia Constitution, 1776. Papers 1:363
“The Greeks and Romans had no standing armies, yet they defended themselves. The Greeks by their laws, and the Romans by the spirit of their people, took care to put into the hands of their rulers no such engine of oppression as a standing army. Their system was to make every man a soldier and oblige him to repair to the standard of his country whenever that was reared. This made them invincible; and the same remedy will make us so.” –Thomas Jefferson to Thomas Cooper, 1814. ME 14:184 ”
http://etext.virginia.edu/jefferson/quotations/jeff1480.htm
What nonsense about a standing army not defending the US. WWII escapes your memory?
Go do some research on that one.
sorry,kid. I’ve done a bit. You’ve got to exclude WWII from your argument
Nope..you need to research some more. The truth is out there.
ok, but give me a hint. I’m just imagining that the Japanese attacked our Navy at Pearl Harbor, right?
My final response tonight. The US was starving Japan of needed resources. Japan negotiated in good faith. The US strung them along. The attack was not a surprise. The code had been broken and the US knew everything that was sent. It was a set up to get the American public to support going to war. They knew and LET IT HAPPEN.
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https://www.nsa.gov/about/cryptologic_heritage/center_crypt_history/pearl_harbor_review/comint.shtml
http://www.international.ucla.edu/eas/documents/jpn-us411207.htm
http://www.historyteacher.net/APUSH-Course/Weblinks/1941_documents__us.htm
http://whatreallyhappened.com/WRHARTICLES/pearl/www.geocities.com/Pentagon/6315/pearl.html?q=pearl/www.geocities.com/Pentagon/6315/pearl.html
well. bb. in the light of day that particular theory has never been other than foolish.
You can not ever show that the US was “starving” Japan of resources other than the ones that were ours.
You also might have a very hard time proving that Japan was deficient in resources other then those that japan wanted to sustain war.
The idea that Japan’s attack was not a surprise doesn’t really change the fact that Japan attacked, does it?
How does a surprise attack on the US Pacific Fleet become anything other than an opening act of aggressive war initiated against ships in their home port?
While Bush and Blair were conspiring to illegally attack Iraq, the US had been secretly bombing Iraq for a year. Read all of the Downing Street Memos to understand how the Iraq invasion justification was based on lies. There was no UN Resolution allowing it to happen and this is why there was not.
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“Text of the Iraq: Legal Background-March 8, 2002 memo from UK Foreign and Commonwealth Office (office of Jack Straw, Foreign Secretary) to Tony Blair advising him on the legality of the use of force against Iraq
USE OF FORCE: (B) SELF-DEFENCE
5. The conditions that have to be met for the exercise of the right of self-defence are well known:
i) There must be an armed attach upon a State or such an attack must be imminent;
ii) The use of force must be necessary and other means to reverse/avert the attack must be unavailable;
iii) The acts in self-defence must be proportionate and strictly confined to the object of stopping the attack.
The right of self-defence may only be exercise until the Security Council has taken measures necessary to ensure international peace and security and anythign [sic] done in exercise fo [sic] the right of self-defence must be immediately reported to the Council.
6. for the exercise of the right of self-defence there must be more than “a threat”. There has to be an armed attack actual or imminent. The development of possession of nuclear weapons does not in itself amount to an armed attack; what would be needed would be clear evidence of an imminent attack. During the Cold War there was certainly a threat in the sense that various States had nuclear weapons which they might, at short notice unleash upon each other. But that did not mean the mere possession of nuclear weapons, or indeed their possession in time of high tension or attempt to obtain them, was sufficient to justify pre-emptive action. And when Israel attacked an Iraqi nuclear reaction, near Baghdad, on 7 June 1981 it was “strongly condemned” by the Security Council (acting unanimously) as a “military” attack ….in clear violation of the Charter of the United Nations and the norms of international conduct”. ”
http://www.downingstreetmemo.com/iraqlegalbacktext.html
Jim..
This, I think, is the wrong message. Why not prayers for the oppressed and suffering rather than the powerful? Jesus’s message was to love one another; not kill one another. Christianity needs a rewrite. It has detoured so radically from the original message that it is almost unrecognizable.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/10/11/obamas-attend-church-at-e_n_316677.html