Christians, War, and the Teachings of Christ

[angellous_evangellous]

got you, my mistake i should have known that, but what about being a cog in the killing machine? taking your pay from the same machine

 

[Popeyesays]

Which clarifies that in both Hebrew and English there is a more than subtle difference between "killing" and "murder".

Regards,
Scott

 

[9-10ths_Penguin]

I'm considering being a chaplain, so I won't be killing anyone.

Are you worried about the potential for having to "serve two masters" in a job like that? I've sometimes thought that military chaplaincy must be one profession where people are pulled in opposite directions quite a bit of the time.

However, the idea of any insertion of religion into the military or the military into religion gives me the secular screaming heebie-jeebies, so you may want to take my opinion with a grain of salt.

 

[angellous_evangellous]

Which clarifies that in both Hebrew and English there is a more than subtle difference between "killing" and "murder".

Regards,
Scott

That distinction is not made in the teachings of Christ... we are neither to kill or murder our enemies, but provide for them...

 

[Popeyesays]

That distinction is not made in the teachings of Christ... we are neither to kill or murder our enemies, but provide for them...

The King James is "tradition" but translations from the Hebrew say "Thous shalt not murder."

I believe that Christ taught forgiveness for sure, and forgiveness is a personal responsibility. A government does not deal in forgiveness so much, and Jesus did say "render unto Caesar what is Caeswar's."

Regards,
Scott

 

[Michel07]

I am by no means a pacifist, and I know that many Christians aren't either. I am actually toying with the idea of joining the military to help pay back student loans.:yes:

However, some teachings of Christ and Paul have been on my mind. It seems to me that we can't love our enemies by killing them, but by passively sacrificing ourselves.

After reading a lot of good reflections I would say just don't go against your own heart and conscience because you are already weighing in the important factors and asking the right questions.

 

[angellous_evangellous]

The King James is "tradition" but translations from the Hebrew say "Thous shalt not murder."

I believe that Christ taught forgiveness for sure, and forgiveness is a personal responsibility. A government does not deal in forgiveness so much, and Jesus did say "render unto Caesar what is Caeswar's."

Regards,
Scott

Yes, but I'm talking about another verse that calls Christians to love their enemies. Killing them or murdering them both breaks that command.

 

[Popeyesays]

New International version of Genesis 20 verses:
12 "Honor your father and your mother, so that you may live long in the land the LORD your God is giving you.
13 "You shall not murder.

In particular Young's Literal does an interesting and thought provoking version of the ten commandments:
2I [am] Jehovah thy God, who hath brought thee out of the land of Egypt, out of a house of servants.

3`Thou hast no other Gods before Me.
4`Thou dost not make to thyself a graven image, or any likeness which [is] in the heavens above, or which [is] in the earth beneath, or which [is] in the waters under the earth.
5Thou dost not bow thyself to them, nor serve them: for I, Jehovah thy God, [am] a zealous God, charging iniquity of fathers on sons, on the third [generation], and on the fourth, of those hating Me,
6and doing kindness to thousands, of those loving Me and keeping My commands.
7`Thou dost not take up the name of Jehovah thy God for a vain thing, for Jehovah acquitteth not him who taketh up His name for a vain thing.
8`Remember the Sabbath-day to sanctify it;
9six days thou dost labour, and hast done all thy work,
10and the seventh day [is] a Sabbath to Jehovah thy God; thou dost not do any work, thou, and thy son, and thy daughter, thy man-servant, and thy handmaid, and thy cattle, and thy sojourner who is within thy gates, --
11for six days hath Jehovah made the heavens and the earth, the sea, and all that [is] in them, and resteth in the seventh day; therefore hath Jehovah blessed the Sabbath-day, and doth sanctify it.
12`Honour thy father and thy mother, so that thy days are prolonged on the ground which Jehovah thy God is giving to thee.
13`Thou dost not murder.
14`Thou dost not commit adultery.
15`Thou dost not steal.
16`Thou dost not answer against thy neighbour a false testimony. 17`Thou dost not desire the house of thy neighbour, thou dost not desire the wife of thy neighbour, or his man-servant, or his handmaid, or his ox, or his ***, or anything which [is] thy neighbour's.'

Regards,

Scott

 

[Popeyesays]

Christians arer called upon to love their enemies individually. The state is required to maintain order for the benefit of its citizens or subjects. We are called upon to obey the law, and Jesus acknowledges that in saying "render unto Caesar . . ."

Regards,
Scott

 

[Ringer]

If I may add my two cents....

The command to love our enemies seems to make the most sense on a personal level and not on the national scale. For instance, would we be wrong as Christians to defend our land in the case of an invasion from a hostile country? I certainly don't believe so. Love those that persecute you in your daily lives. When an opposing faction decides to wipe an entire group of people off the face of the earth, it's time to defend your God given right to live.

 

[9-10ths_Penguin]

Christians arer called upon to love their enemies individually. The state is required to maintain order for the benefit of its citizens or subjects. We are called upon to obey the law, and Jesus acknowledges that in saying "render unto Caesar . . ."

The other half of that is "render unto God that which is God's", though. And how is even an enemy nation not a collection of individuals?

And how does this distinction between individuals and nations extend to war? Should a soldier have mercy on his enemy when in hand-to-hand combat, while a general makes strategic decisions that cost huge numbers of lives?

Also, except in the case of a draft, people can choose to not serve in the military without breaking any law.

If I may add my two cents....

The command to love our enemies seems to make the most sense on a personal level and not on the national scale. For instance, would we be wrong as Christians to defend our land in the case of an invasion from a hostile country? I certainly don't believe so. Love those that persecute you in your daily lives. When an opposing faction decides to wipe an entire group of people off the face of the earth, it's time to defend your God given right to live.

Do you have a God-given right to live? Personally, I would defend my own life vehemently, but I'm unclear on where this idea would come from in a Christian context.

My interpretation from the Gospels is that God will provide everything you need; if you can be deprived of it, you didn't truly need it.

Isn't over-attachment to your physical life, or even the life of another, an example of "storing up your treasures on Earth"?

 

[sean_the_iconoclast]

I'd have to agree with Angellous that qualifiers like the distinction between personal and national enemies has no foundation in Jesus's teaching. Furthermore, where is a God-given right to life or anything else spelled out in the Bible? I don't recall any of the early Christians fighting for such a thing on behalf of themselves or others. Finally, didn't Jesus say something like he who seeks to preserve his life will lose it, but he who gives up his life will find it?

 

[Popeyesays]

"The other half of that is "render unto God that which is God's", though. And how is even an enemy nation not a collection of individuals?

And how does this distinction between individuals and nations extend to war? Should a soldier have mercy on his enemy when in hand-to-hand combat, while a general makes strategic decisions that cost huge numbers of lives?

Also, except in the case of a draft, people can choose to not serve in the military without breaking any law."

A state is a collwction of individual but so is a corporation and under law corporations have identities seperate from the individuals that constitute it.

In short states do not practice vengeance, they practice law and punishment under the law is not vengeance either. Christians are instructed not to practice vengeance, police and the courts and even the executioners do not practice vengeance, they practice law.

Now as a Baha`i I am told that to die is better than to murder. I am also informed that I should do what I can to protect another's life.

I am to practice forgiveness, but I am to obey the law of the land wherein I reside. If I am drafted, for instance, I serve--in a non-combatant role if possible--but to obey if such a role is not allowed.

If I am a policeman by profession that is a public duty, and I obey the law and my service should be honored.

If one's state goes to war, I am subject to the law unless I leave that state. A law in defense of invasion is a just war under my religious beliefs, so I should serve if conscripted.

Is it up to me to volunteer in time of peace? That is my decision, it isn't encouraged in my faith, but my decision is mine.

Regards,
Scott

 

[sean_the_iconoclast]

Regarding rendering to Caesar, that has a specific context that is being ignored, and in any case I don't think Jesus would have considered human life the property of Caesar.

 

[Popeyesays]

Regarding rendering to Caesar, that has a specific context that is being ignored, and in any case I don't think Jesus would have considered human life the property of Caesar.

Well, the reference was to taxes and the right of observant Jews to pay or not pay anything other than temple taxes. But Jesus was not a lawyer, He spoke in broad brush strokes and His words should be given wide attention.

The life of a human is not owned by the state, the behavior of that life is required to follow certain qualities of social responsibility.

As a child of the sixties, I find myself very much in agreement with the Zen question "What they gave a war, and no one came?"

Of course the corrolary is "What if a war is forced upon you and no one defends themselves?"

Both action and inaction have consequences.

Regards,
Scott

 

[jtartar]

I am by no means a pacifist, and I know that many Christians aren't either. I am actually toying with the idea of joining the military to help pay back student loans.:yes:

However, some teachings of Christ and Paul have been on my mind. It seems to me that we can't love our enemies by killing them, but by passively sacrificing ourselves.

angellous_evangellous,
War and Christianity are incompatible, where war starts, Christianity stops!!!
We are told that we should follow Jesus steps closely, 1Pet 2:21. To Jesus a follower of his was enen more loved than his own family, if the did not believe, Matt 12:47-50.
Here is something to contemplate; can you see Jesus in a foxhole or trench, crawling around shooting at his disciples, just because a fanatic leader of a country told him to. Remember there are people of all churches in every country. If they go to war they would be killing the very ones that Jesus died for.
The scriptures tells us that we should be willing to die for our brother, not kill our brother, 1John 3:16.
War is anathema to a Christian!!!

 

[9-10ths_Penguin]

Here is something to contemplate; can you see Jesus in a foxhole or trench, crawling around shooting at his disciples, just because a fanatic leader of a country told him to. Remember there are people of all churches in every country. If they go to war they would be killing the very ones that Jesus died for.

If we're to believe Revelation, it's more Jesus' style to lead the armies as a general rather than crawl through trenches like an infantryman.

 

[angellous_evangellous]

If we're to believe Revelation, it's more Jesus' style to lead the armies as a general rather than crawl through trenches like an infantryman.

That's a different Jesus from the Gospels. Completely.

However, it does fit with the notion that vengeance belongs to God. The whole motivation behind Christian pacifism is that God will work out perfect justice, and in Revelation and 2 Thess, Jesus is bringing about that vengeance.

This apocalyptic Christ has a parallel in 2 Thess 2.

ESV 2 Thessalonians 2:1 Now concerning the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ and our being gathered together to him, we ask you, brothers, 2 not to be quickly shaken in mind or alarmed, either by a spirit or a spoken word, or a letter seeming to be from us, to the effect that the day of the Lord has come. 3 Let no one deceive you in any way. For that day will not come, unless the rebellion comes first, and the man of lawlessness is revealed, the son of destruction, 4 who opposes and exalts himself against every so-called god or object of worship, so that he takes his seat in the temple of God, proclaiming himself to be God. 5 Do you not remember that when I was still with you I told you these things? 6 And you know what is restraining him now so that he may be revealed in his time. 7 For the mystery of lawlessness is already at work. Only he who now restrains it will do so until he is out of the way. 8 And then the lawless one will be revealed, whom the Lord Jesus will kill with the breath of his mouth and bring to nothing by the appearance of his coming. 9 The coming of the lawless one is by the activity of Satan with all power and false signs and wonders, 10 and with all wicked deception for those who are perishing, because they refused to love the truth and so be saved. 11 Therefore God sends them a strong delusion, so that they may believe what is false, 12 in order that all may be condemned who did not believe the truth but had pleasure in unrighteousness.

 

[Valjean]

This notion that The State is a natural entity, that it has some divine status or sanction; that an individual, by virtue of having chanced to be born within its borders owes it some sort of allegience -- is, in a sense, owned by it -- has become pervasive in recent centuries.
Nationalism is a human invention. Nationalim allows soldiers to kill innocnt, non-cobattent men, women and children, (coldly or with hatred -- it matters not), and still feel they are blameless, that, as a tool of the state, the state (seargent, captain, general) is taking their sins upon itself; that they are rendered not responsible for their actions.

Under this notion that Jesus' exhortation to peace and brotherhood applied only to personal enemies or to geographically immediate neighbors; that "state enemies" resided outside a Christian's moral universe and were not subject to the biblical injunctions against harm, the soldiers on both sides of any conflict would be in the right. In WW II the Nazis and Americans would both have been behaving properly and blameless.

I believe a person is individually responsible for his every action. If a friend, an employer, a city council or a government tells him to do something wrong, and he performs the act, he reaps 100% of the karma. The wages of his sin do not redound to the commanding entity, but entirely to the perpetrator. Christian teachings hold that only one person can take the sins of another upon Himself.
How is it that a person can go to Sunday school/church every week, for his entire life, and then abandon everything he was taught there after boot camp? Why do people so easily defer to an authority that tells them its OK to coldly burn/asphyxiate 100,000 innocent civilians in Dresden or, with hate, torture and execute, one by one, hundreds of women, children and old men in My Lai?

God's law trumps man's law. What you read in the Beatitudes trumps a seargent's command. God does not distinguish between a neighbor next door and a neighbor in Baghdad. If you treat a "national enemy" any different than you would your own parents or children you are held to account for it. It won't benefit you to reap social approbation if you loose your soul.

What if everyone put Jesus' teachings before the interests of the state?
What if they gave a war and nobody came?

 

[Michel07]

That's a different Jesus from the Gospels. Completely.

However, it does fit with the notion that vengeance belongs to God. The whole motivation behind Christian pacifism is that God will work out perfect justice, and in Revelation and 2 Thess, Jesus is bringing about that vengeance.

This apocalyptic Christ has a parallel in 2 Thess 2.

ESV 2 Thessalonians 2:1 Now concerning the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ and our being gathered together to him, we ask you, brothers, 2 not to be quickly shaken in mind or alarmed, either by a spirit or a spoken word, or a letter seeming to be from us, to the effect that the day of the Lord has come. 3 Let no one deceive you in any way. For that day will not come, unless the rebellion comes first, and the man of lawlessness is revealed, the son of destruction, 4 who opposes and exalts himself against every so-called god or object of worship, so that he takes his seat in the temple of God, proclaiming himself to be God. 5 Do you not remember that when I was still with you I told you these things? 6 And you know what is restraining him now so that he may be revealed in his time. 7 For the mystery of lawlessness is already at work. Only he who now restrains it will do so until he is out of the way. 8 And then the lawless one will be revealed, whom the Lord Jesus will kill with the breath of his mouth and bring to nothing by the appearance of his coming. 9 The coming of the lawless one is by the activity of Satan with all power and false signs and wonders, 10 and with all wicked deception for those who are perishing, because they refused to love the truth and so be saved. 11 Therefore God sends them a strong delusion, so that they may believe what is false, 12 in order that all may be condemned who did not believe the truth but had pleasure in unrighteousness.

You are so right. It is a different Jesus because it is the Ressurected Christ, the conquerer of death and sin. No longer just the Lamb in flesh.