Saturday 30 January 2010

'Just' War and the Bible

When wearing my uniform I often get the question, "How can a Christian be a soldier? The Bible tells us that we should not kill and yet you obviously condone it!" What a great starting point for our discussion because our first step hits a much quoted misconception in that what, as I understand it, the Bible actually says in Exodus chapter six (verse thirteen - commandment six) is - "You shall not commit murder."

Murder is the felonious taking of life. If someone walks down a street and shoots an innocent passer-by they have committed murder; If someone is convicted of a capital crime and is hanged, injected, shot or whatever - they have been killed (although the means are questionable perhaps, this is still the case); if someone engaged in a war and loses their life they are killed whereas those who are not (Civillians and others with 'protected' status under the Geneva conventions) they are murdered. Easy isn't it?

This of course gives us our first statement in that "
Being engaged in a 'Just' and legal war does not automatically, or correctly, confer the status of murderer!" Although of course naughtiness and other excesses such as lack of proportionality, targeting wrong places or people might just render those being naughty as 'war criminals'. This is an important point - morally and Biblically!

Now, can we find the Bible supporting engagement with others in military ways? I guess we might just find a clue when it comes to dealing with 'naughty' people in 1 Samuel, chapter fifteen (verses two and three):

"
This is what the Lord Almighty says: ‘I will punish the Amalekites for what they did to Israel when they waylaid them as they came up from Egypt. Now go, attack the Amalekites and totally destroy everything that belongs to them. Do not spare them; put to death men and women, children and infants, cattle and sheep, camels and donkeys.’”

Looks like God says that acting against aggressors is justified doesn't it? And before someone starts a debate about being a cruel, hateful or wicked God can I point out that the putting everyone and everything, smashing up the happy homes and salting the ground is actually all about peace. It removes the prospect of re-ignited conflict from geographic or bloodlines (What we call a 'feud'). So, our second statement is that this: 
"Those who act against others and take up arms and murder will find themselves acted against and they will use force - real force!"

Defending the weak? Perhaps we could toss in Psalm Eighty-Two (verse three):
"Defend the poor and the fatherless - do justice to the afflicted and needy." Seems to me that we are seeing a principle emerge here. We are to act for those who are unable to act for themselves and as I understand it, this means to take up arm in the ways described in the previous post. So statement the third has to be, "defend the weak, the homeless, the orphaned in whichever ways you can - supporting them financially, providing health care, ensuring they are fed and just to make sure that whatever you do or send isn't dissipated or come to nothing - be prepared to take up arms to set the conditions for relief and aid to be effective. i.e. stop genocide, murder, oppressive regimes and general wickedness."

Pacifism is great - you just need to be prepared to fight for it!

Igitur qui desiderat pacem, praeparet Bellum - Therefore, he who desires peace should (first) prepare for war




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