|
| |
Who said, "Good explanation of Romans 13, and I totally agree with your analysis. I still am wondering about the third person suffering question. I guess I'll just have to buckle down and do some reading."?
See the first comment for the answer.Labels: Nonviolence, Pacifism, Romans 13, Suffering
 
|
|
|
7 Comments:
Answer: Professor Chad Ragsdale, in a conversation I'd completely forgotten about until I rediscovered it (here). Interestingly, that rediscovered conversation of ours has some heavy-duty overlap with a recent conversation we've been having (here).
Although I think the whole conversation is an interesting one, I'll post here my remarks on Romans 13 to save anyone interested the trouble of digging for it. The only thing I have to commend my interpretation of Romans 13 is the word of Prof. Chad Ragsdale, who in a blurb wrote, "Good explanation of Romans 13, and I totally agree with your analysis."
Here it is, unedited from the original:
While, with you, I won't claim to be an "expert," I think it's safe to say I'm read up on the literature surrounding the passage. First, that God "establishes" authorities does not mean that God sanctifies or even approves of those authorities. To the Jewish mind, to say that God "orders" the authorities is not to condone them but to condemn them, because it also means that God will depose them. Isaiah 10, Jeremiah 29. God uses violent, evil, pagan empires for his purposes, but then turns around and condemns those same empires for doing the very things he used them to do. God is not sanctioning their violence. He is channeling the evil that is already present in them in order to put it to work for his people, who are in every respect separate and distinct from the empires he's using to enact his wrath. What's more, more often than not, it's his own people God is using these pagan empires to punish. Paul's point in Romans 13 is not that government is good. That would make Paul incredibly naïve, and probably an amnesiac, because he knew full well how evil Rome was. Paul's point is not that the Roman sword is a good thing. He's warning the Roman Christians not to stir up trouble and so bring Rome's wrath down on them. Paul wrote this at a time when Nero's rhetoric was that he was the peaceful emperor, whose sword remained sheathed, and who only wore body army for good looks (because, it is implied, he is too peaceable to require protection). Against this rhetoric, Paul says, "Beware the sword." Both Jews and Christians had experienced the injustice of Roman government just a few years prior, and anti-semitism among Romans was stronger now than ever. We must not forget that Romans 13 comes right on the tails of Romans 12:14, 17-21, wherein the Roman Christians are exhorted to love their enemies (i.e., the Romans), and not to return evil for evil but to overcome evil with good. Romans 13:1-7 is then a practical example of how Christians could treat their enemies positively even amid the threat of persecution. Romans 13:8ff ties it back to Romans 12, by reminding them that all of this (i.e. 13:1-7) is motivated by love. Romans 13:11-12 encourages the Roman Christians to subordinate themselves to an evil empire in the knowledge that this situation is temporary, that they will soon be saved from the powers that oppress them, because the darkness is passing away and the light is dawning on the new age.
To use this passage to justify an unjust war is absurd. Furthermore, when Paul wrote it, there was only one "state" to contend with. But in our day, how are we to know which of the many nation-states is currently God's agent of wrath? Could we possibly have any criteria to discern that? Or do we just default to assuming that God is currently using the country we happen to be living in? Furthermore, even if it is true that God is currently using America as an agent of wrath, that is not to America's glory but to her doom. For to be an agent of God's wrath is at once to be the object of God's wrath, just as Satan is said to be an agent of God.
Here are some quotes from Kittel, vol. 5:
"This means that ungodly forces become instruments of the wrath of God against the world" (439).
"It is by a detour that devilish wrath comes to serve the wrath of God" (439).
"The second evaluation and classification of the wrath of the devil lies behind the NT statements, and this is true even where the devil seems to stand independently alongside and in opposition to God. The devil is never more than God's bailiff. Unwittingly and unwillingly he is an instrument of the wrath of God whose functions he has only apparently taken under his own wing, cf. 1 C. 2:8" (440).
"But the devil is also an object and victim of divine wrath. . . . We see here a basic principle of the divine governance. To be an instrument of God's wrath is eo ipso to be also its victim. . . . In the old covenant this is true of the great powers (cf. Is. 10:5-19 with 5:25-30 and 1 Ch. 27:24 with 2 S. 24:1) in relation to Israel. In the new it is true of the Jews in relation to Christians and the new Israel. . . . It is also true of Judas (cf. Lk. 17:1) and esp. of the devil himself" (440).
"Finally, the relation of political power to the wrath of God is to be seen in the same light. In R. 13:4 the exousia is called theou diakonos eis orgen ekdikos to to kakon prassonti" (440).
"The Bible regards many pagan peoples and rulers as executors of God's wrath. They are this even when, like the devil, they consciously fight against God and His people. In so doing they unconsciously rage in truth against themselves. . . . This is the picture of political powers in Rev., and it is here that we may see the inner unity between R. 13 and Rev. 13 ff."
The next sentence is where I begin to disagree with his interpretation.
"At all times the exousiai may fall from their position as ministers. If they do, they become servants of the devil rather than servants of God, as the images of Rev. show. Like their master, they then fall even more under the wrath of God whose instruments they were chosen to be" (441).
The problem with this conclusion is that it isn't historically accurate. No pagan power "fell" from being God's agent of wrath. All were in opposition to God already, before God put them to work for his purposes. The historical reality has always been that to be an agent of God's wrath is at once to be an agent of Satan's wrath, and thus to be a victim of God's wrath as well. There is no "good wrath" and "bad wrath." The "wrath" is always demonic, always an act of rebellion against God. But God in his sovereignty is still able to use this wrath for his own purposes, to hijack, as it were, the violence of empires, and put it to work for the sake of his people and by way of extension for the sake of the world.
Thus, even if the United States is currently God's agent of wrath, that does not bode well for the United States. How much less should we who are set apart as agents of God's mercy take part in the damnable duty of the agent of wrath?
Even though you and I are not in COMPLETE agreement on Rom. 13, we agree more than we disagree. Both of us reject the usual, authoritarian reading--and the use of Rom. 13 to justify Christian participation in war or support for the death penalty, etc.
Hi, I've been reading some of the posts the past few days, and it is nice to see a fellow RMer(although I guess I'm technically on the more conservative side(coC), technically I'm liberal to them LOL) that is a "pacifist." I don't like that term because I agree with Brimlow that the modern sense of pacifism just allows evil to happen, and piggybacks on people that may be willing to fight. I think what we agree on is gospel activism. Stopping the evil in the world with active love, and living the sermon on the mount. I understand that is the true meaning of pacifism, but the stigma that is carried seems to make me find another name.
With Rom.13, and I am just an amateur at theology, I've read the whole book in the light of Jewish/Gentile relationships at the Church in Rome. With 12 leading into 13 I agree with you almost completely. Historically I've read that since this was around the time the Jews would be returning from the forced move as Instituted in the 40's, this may be an exhortation for the Christians to not misbehave on part of some of their Jewish contemporaries who were already raising problems again, as well as not to retaliate against the government under persecution. Now all of that may be completely wrong, but just wanted to stop by and say hey. I've just started my own blog so maybe we can have some dialogue.
Thanks,
Logan
I agree with some of your conclusions, though not with the all the arguments you use to reach them. No, I don't believe that Romans 13 can be used to justify an unjust war, or even to justify war (I don't accept the premiss of a "just" war either).
But there are other interesting biblical passages, such as Psalm 82.
Logan,
Thanks for dropping in and commenting. Are you in studies somewhere? It's interesting to me that you're considered a liberal in the coC for being pacifist. I was under the impression that there were more pacifists in the coC than in the ICC.
I like to say that I'm a conservative RMer precisely because I'm a pacifist. After all, all the original RM leaders were stanch pacifists, especially David Lipscomb, the big figure in the coC.
I agree with your language of "gospel activism." You're absolutely right that "pacifism" is stigmatized. I always make the distinction between "passivism" and "pacifism" and point out that the latter comes from the Latin, pac facere, "to make peace," which implicates us in all sorts of activity.
Yes, your reading of Romans 13 was first famously argued by Marcus Borg in an essay called, "A New Context for Romans XIII," New Testament Studies 19 (1972-73), 205-18. I don't agree with every point of Borg's, but some of his outline I have found to be incontrovertible and infinitely useful.
Another interesting essay is T.L. Carter, "The Irony of Romans 13," Novum Testamentum XLVI 3 (2004), 209-28. Again, I don't agree with his every point, but I think there are some important lines of argument we can no longer escape.
I look forward to further dialogue with you.
Michael and Steve,
Yes, I think this is a longstanding disagreement between us. I'll just clarify a couple of things.
1) I put this particular post up here to point out to a guy I've been arguing with on my "Death at New Life" post that he has now gone back on some of his earlier statements.
2) I completely understand the nature of your disagreement with the reading of Romans 13 I'm inclined towards. I do not pretend for a second to claim that the ironic reading is the only nonviolent reading of the passage. I was a happy advocate of the Amish/dualistic reading ("dualistic" is not a pejorative in this case) until I came upon the work of James C. Scott. After Weapons of the Weak and Domination and the Arts of Resistance, it has been impossible for me to read Romans 13 in the same way. Now I have serious reservations about some of the particular appropriations of Scott's work by lib. theologians in application to Romans 13. I think there are some stretches (more-so in Carter's essay, cited above, than in Neil Elliott's "Romans 13:1-7 in the Context of Imperial Propaganda," in Horsley (ed.), Paul and Empire). Nevertheless, serious attention to Scott's work has transformed the way I read any text pertaining to power relations, including my own writings on power relations, and certainly not least Romans 13.
Scott has also made more sense of 1 Peter 2 for me. In kind of ambiguous language, Peter commends subordination to the emperor, and leaves unsaid anything negative about the emperor. He then goes on to commend the subordination of slaves to unjust masters, right on the heels of his commendation of subordination to the emperor. Without saying anything explicit about the emperor, the message is clear: our subordination has nothing to do with whether or not the emperor is just. On the contrary.
Post a Comment
<< Home