Blessed are the peacemakers, for they will be called sons of God. Blessed are those who are persecuted because of righteousness, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. Blessed are you when people insult you, persecute you and falsely say all kinds of evil against you because of me. Rejoice and be glad, because great is your reward in heaven, for in the same way they persecuted the prophets who were before you. (Matt. 5:9-12)
You have heard that it was said, "An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth." But I tell you, Do not resist by evil means. But whoever slaps you on your right cheek, turn the other to him also. If anyone wants to sue you and take away your tunic, let him have your cloak also. And whoever forces you to go one mile, go with him two. [Note: Many have misinterpreted these instructions as an ethic of nonresistance. Better exegesis displays that they are in fact practical, shrewd, ingenious strategies for nonviolent resistance and conflict transformation.] You have heard that it was said, "Love your neighbor and hate your enemy." But I tell you: Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, that you may be sons of your Father in heaven. He causes his sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous. If you love those who love you, what reward will you get? Are not even the tax collectors doing that? And if you greet only your brothers, what are you doing more than others? Do not even pagans do that? Be perfect, therefore, as your heavenly Father is perfect. (Matt. 5:38-48)
Put your sword in its place, for all who take up the sword will perish by the sword. (Matt. 26:52)
You know that those who regard themselves as rulers over the Gentiles lord it over them, and their high officials exercise authority over them. Not so with you. Instead, whoever wants to become great among you must be your servant, and whoever wants to be first must be slave of all. For even the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many. (Mark 10:42-45)
My kingdom is not of this world. If my kingdom were of this world, my servants would fight, so that I should not be delivered to the Jews; but now my kingdom is from another place. (John 18:36)
Jesus does not say that his kingdom is not for this world, nor does he say that his kingdom is not in this world. He says that his kingdom is not of this world, i.e., that it is not worldly. Rather it is from another place. This does not mean that Jesus’ kingdom is merely spiritual while Caesar’s kingdom is physical/political. It means that the authority backing his kingdom comes from YHWH, and that therefore his kingdom does not depend upon worldly strategies for stability and expansion.
Labels: Early Christians, Nonviolence, Pacifism
6 Comments:
I'd love to hear more from you about the misreading of the sermon on the mount that arrives at nonresistance. This is an argument I've encountered from those who think pacifism is unbiblical.
Amen to your point about the kingdom. I hate it when this text gets spiritualized and used to justify all manner of vile 'pragmatism'.
Hey, Aric.
I follow Wink and Stassen in my reading of the Sermon, and they both really provide complimentary exegesis that far outstretches the conservative "exegesis" that spiritualizes and internalizes the ethic of the Sermon, or reduces it to interpersonal relations. You can download Wink's essay here, and Stassen's here.
Wink argues persuasively that "turn the other cheek," "give your tunic also" and "go the second mile" are radical strategies for nonviolent resistance that take the initiative away from the oppressor and puts it in the hands of the oppressed.
Turn the other cheek: Briefly, if you are struck on the right cheek, you are struck with the back of your "superior's" right hand. Turning the other cheek forces him to use his left-hand (a no-no) or to hit you open handed (which is how peers hit peers, not how superiors hit inferiors). In short, turning the other cheek is the refusal to allow the superior to remain superior. In taking the initiative and giving oneself over to indignity, one's dignity is won.
The giving of the inner-garment: Wink shows that the setting is not in private but in court, where a money-lender/superior is suing his debtor/inferior for his outer garment as surety for the money owed. This was standard practice in Jesus' day, and was a way of utterly humiliating and shaming the poor. Jesus says to let him take your coat, and to give him your underwear too! Yes, Jesus suggests the debtor strip naked in court. The idea is to put on display the depravity of the opressor, who has literally taken everything from the oppressed. Moreover, in Jesus' society, it wasn't the one naked who was shamed, but the one who witnessed the nakedness. Therefore, this was a strategy for speaking truth to power and shaming the powerful, exposing them for what they really were. It is nonviolent protest, not doormat nonresistance.
Going the second mile: This refers to the practice of the Roman occupying army of forcing the conquered to carry their very heavy packs for them. According to Roman military law, a soldier could not force a person to carry his pack for more than one mile. To do so would be (at least according to the law books) to incur strict punishment. Of course, forcing the conquered to carry the packs of the soldiers was a huge symbol of Roman domination. In this context, Jesus says, "If someone forces you to carry his pack one mile, go with him two." During the first mile, everything is status quo. The oppressed is oppressed, and the oppressor has full command of the situation. Come the end of the first mile, the oppressed insists he will continue, and the situation is radically subverted. He is now carrying the pack willingly, voluntarily. The soldier is thinking, "Why is he doing me this kindness? Is he trying to get me in trouble? What?" All of a sudden the initiative is taken from the oppressor and put in the hands of the oppressed. In fact, for the length of the second mile, the oppressed is no longer oppressed. This strategy has numerous possible ramifications: (1) conflict transformation. The Jew/Christian or whoever might be able to befriend the soldier. (2) the dissolution of the practice. If the practice of going the second mile became widespread enough, soldiers would be liable to quit their practice of forcing people to carry their packs, for fear of the legal repercussions of that illicit second mile.
These show that Jesus is not advocating nonresistance/passivity, but nonviolent resistance/active peacemaking. Some of Jesus' strategies are designed to expose and shame oppressors, some are designed to transform them, all are designed to put the initiative in the hands of the oppressed, to empower the disempowered. It is not doormat nonresistance that Jesus is advocating, but protest strategies designed to transform unjust structures into just ones. These are, in the words of James C. Scott, the "weapons of the weak." These are strategies for political engagement, not disengagement, and they seek justice through nonviolent means. Of course, as particularly in the case of the debtor's court, the strategies Jesus encourages might not be characterized as "peaceful" (parading one's naked body in the face of the oppressor is not meant to make the oppressor happy), but they are all nonviolent.
Two further things: First, these strategies only make sense as an ethic for marginalized, disempowered people. And thus, they are not "individualistic" ethics, for "interpersonal relations." Rather, they are political strategies that will only work if an entire people puts them into practice. While they certainly are commendable to the individual, the emphasis is not on the personal purity of the ethical actor but on the conflict transformation made possible by the act. In order for the transformation to really take place, this kind of activity needs to be widespread. Jesus is not speaking to the "individual," but to the kahal, the people of God, the holy nation.
Second, these are not legalistic principles, nor are they a comprehensive list. They are merely representative of the kind of strategies God's people are to take up in their struggle against injustice, whatever the context. In order to truly "turn the other cheek" and "go the second mile," followers of Jesus are required to have creative, ingenious moral/ethical imaginations. That is something we must develop through a long process of conversion and experience in solidarity with the sufferers of the world. This kind of creative political activism is not something we're just born with, and it consistently defies the "common sense" of political communities that are constituted and sustained by violence.
Stassen's brilliant essay argues against the standard "antithetical" interpretation of the ethical precepts of the Sermon (you have heard it said/but I say to you). Most interpreters put the emphasis on Jesus' antithesis and leave it at that. Stassen argues that the structure is not antithetical but "triadic," and the emphasis falls not on the "but I say to you," but on the "therefore" prescription which follows. For example, the saying on murder cites the OT prohibition of murder, but then locates the problem in the "but I say to you" in the heart, and the attitude we adopt toward one another. The emphasis falls on the "therefore": "Therefore, if you are offering your gift at the altar and there remember that your brother has something against you, leave your gift there in front of the altar. First go and be reconciled to your brother; then come and offer your gift."
This third part of the triad, Stassen calls the "transforming initiative" that provides the way out of the vicious cycle of violence.
When Stassen comes to the "eye for eye" and "hate your enemy" section, the emphasis falls on the "transforming initiatives": turn the other cheek, give the tunic also, go the second mile, pray for the persecutors.
Moreover, Stassen argues very persuasively that verse 39a is consistently mistranslated as either, "Do not resist evil," or "Do not resist the evil one/person." Stassen does some solid exegesis here that displaying that a proper translation should read: "Do not resist by evil means." The most common use of the word "resist" refers to armed, militant resistance, and fits right in with Jesus' historical-political context. Further, he argues persuasively that "evil" is not objective in the clause but agentive. Thus, "Do not resist by evil means."
So, that is what I meant when I said that Jesus did not commend nonresistance. Rather, Jesus gave ingenious tactics for nonviolent resistance and conflict transformation.
Thom,
Penny for your thoughts here: what do you make of Jesus' words to the disciples in Luke 22: 35-38, wherein Jesus tells them to take purses and swords?
This passage came up in one of my classes and I could not come up with a good counter to what my students were saying, other than it needed to read in light of everything Jesus taught... which seems true, but insufficient to really understand what Jesus is saying here.
- Christian
Christian,
Thanks for stopping by and for your question.
Obviously, Jesus did not mean for his disciples to actually carry swords and to use them against their enemies/persecutors. If that is what Jesus meant then he wouldn't have told Peter to put away his sword that very night. Moreover, his disciples would have continued to carry swords from then on, which they didn't. Instead they suffered.
What Jesus is saying is metaphorical. He is speaking to them about the gravity of the life ahead of them. They misunderstand, as always, and say, "Here. Look. We have two swords. Is that enough?"
Two swords? Are you kidding me? There are five hundred soldiers to contend with that very night. Moreover, the disciples know full well what they're up against, if indeed (as they mistakingly think) the militant revolution is about to begin. Two swords enough to start a revolution?
I can't help but think that maybe in the front of their minds is the miracle of the loaves and the fish. "Jesus multipled the fish. Maybe he'll multiply our swords. Two is more than enough to get Jesus started."
Jesus' response is not affirming. Clearly two swords isn't enough for what they're thinking. Jesus says, "That's enough," as in, "Enough already!" Even after all this time, on this final night, his disciples continue to misunderstand him. Jesus set them straight once and for all when Peter, probably imagining he'd been listening closely to his master, pulls the sword and offs Malchus's ear. Jesus commands Peter to put away his sword, not just for the time being but once and for all. Jesus' maxim, "He who lives by the sword shall die by the sword," is not a tentative condemnation. It is clearly a wholesale condemnation.
It would have been very strange for Jesus, who taught love of enemy, conflict transformation, to suddenly change his M.O. the last night he's alive. This saying of Jesus about the "time to carry swords," is clearly metaphorical, as is indicated by his earlier teaching, by his frustrated, dismissive response to his disciples' taking him literally, and by the absurdity of the notion that two swords was actually enough to wage a war against Rome, or even to protect themselves from roving gangs of bandits along the road.
Christian,
Here is a slightly different, though mostly similar answer to the same question, by Greg Boyd.
Thom,
Thanks, this was quite helpful. I also didn't realize that Greg Boyd was so tough looking... geesh!
Oh, I've also enjoyed the debate we'be been having over on Halden't blog... although you seem to have the rhetorical upper hand (that's not a backhanded compliment, just straight up praise).
In case you're still wondering, here's my email address: amondstien@gmail.com
peace,
Christian
p.s. Are you still living in Missouri? Any word on graduate school yet?
p.p.s. Is there a way to see the names of all the people pictured on your blog? I recognized most, but not all of them.
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