War and Peace

[Paidiske]

Here is the exchange:

Hey, it's not weird that you latched onto the idea that there was no alternative in WWII. That was the whole reason I brought it up. WWII presents war-as-a-last-resort. You picked up on that and agreed with it.

I did not agree that war was the last resort. In fact I was at pains to point out that other avenues had not been adequately explored.

Earlier today you were refusing the legitimacy of defensive wars, though thankfully you were not entirely refusing to consider their possibility. Who know what tomorrow may bring?

I am refusing the legitimacy of war in any sense. That particular individuals may find themselves caught up in warfare in particular circumstances in which they are personally less culpable does not, for one second, mean I am saying war is ever legitimate.

Oh dear.

Actually, it's quite interesting to ponder what the place of the Magi in the infancy narratives suggests about our common humanity.

 

[zippy2006]

I did not agree that war was the last resort. In fact I was at pains to point out that other avenues had not been adequately explored.

Well here's what you said 15 minutes ago in an attempt to clarify your words from yesterday:

Ah. I think I misread something. I do not believe there was any point where war was "the only option to stop Hitler." There would have come a point for various countries where they were embroiled at war and they had no reasonable option to be immediately be not at war; in effect at that point "other alternatives had closed."

Sounds like a last resort.

Actually, it's quite interesting to ponder what the place of the Magi in the infancy narratives suggests about our common humanity.

True!

 

[Paidiske]

Well here's what you said 15 minutes ago in an attempt to clarify your words from yesterday:

Sounds like a last resort.

What I was trying to say was, say we choose a point in time at which a country is already embroiled in war; that war cannot immediately cease upon one's deciding that it would be desirable.

But that is not the same as arguing that war is good, or right, or just, or should ever be justified, or that countries not at war should seek war as a solution to their problems.

 

[Hmm]

But that is not the same as arguing that war is good, or right, or just, or should ever be justified, or that countries not at war should seek war as a solution to their problems.

I think this is true - interesting debate btw. I think an analogy that shiws this is suppose you were shielding a family of Jews in your house in WWII and soldiers knocked on your door and asked you if you were hiding any Jews. What would you say? I hope I would have said No but I wouldn't go on from that to develop a theory of Just Lying and try to define all the scenarios in which lying wss justified. The act of lying remains wrong in itself - there is no such thing as "just lying" - and I must acknowledge this even though I decided that in this instance I would lie for a greater good.

I would fight for my country only if it was invaded and killing had started - I would never invade another country on the pretext of preventing war because there would always be something else to try first.

 

[Quid est Veritas?]

Jesus seems to accept the function of a state entity, a state entity as bad as the Roman Empire.

How 'bad' is the Roman Empire? The Empire functions in superlatives - they sow salt in Carthage and sack Corinth and run out of wood to crucify fallen Jerusalem - but also, the Pax Romana was the longest period of sustained relative peace in the history of the area, with great strides in the material well-being, health and hygiene of the populace. Rome expanded their franchise, so that eventually everyone was Roman, and felt it. The Greeks called themselves Rhomaioi till the 19th century. Rome co-opted peoples and their leaders, had mechanisms of redress, etc. Cross Rome and she was brutal, but otherwise she was fairly benign - provided you pay your taxes and keep quiet; baring the exceptions that prove the rule, like Prasutagus' daughters' rape or we Christians that kept making trouble in the temples (so as Trajan told Pliny, don't seek them out but prosecute them if brought to you). That is why the Roman persecutions were localised and of short duration, with only the Great Persecution of Diocletian being a serious attempt. If Rome was as serious about stamping out Christianity as they were about Carthage, there would just be martyrs - look at how effectively the Tokugawa could curtail Christianity in Japan, or the Spanish Inquisition Protestantism.

Jesus accepted Rome because Rome was there to create the conditions for the early Church to flourish. Render unto Caesar. There is a world of difference between the Roman Empire in general, and say a state like Nazi Germany or Antiochus IV Epimanes or the Soviets. Direct Roman rule was probably a better option than Herodian rule, I'd wager.

---


My 2 cents on the topic:
1 Samuel 8 tells us about the evils of governments. Nevertheless, people need a 'king' to judge between them, to represent them, to fight battles for them. Humans aren't perfect, and if they were, than any system would be wonderful or no system at all. People do wrong to each other, and such wrongs can only be passively accepted to a point. We are told to love our neighbour as ourself, but if you were attacked, would you not want your neighbour to come to your defence? That is the essence of the old concept of Christian Knighthood - knight being derived from kneg, meaning a servant. It is to serve your fellow man by defending them from the evils of other fellow men. Within that lies all concepts of Just War, as bold action to right wrongs. It is the same kind of thing as an amputation, necessary to save the body as a whole, but a loathsome thing to have to do.

This does not excuse individual action though: Was it right to oppose Nazi Germany militarily? Of course. Does it justify every excess, like firebombing Dresden? Probably not. Similarly, if I rise to defend someone but use excessive force to achieve it, that is itself not laudable. As Jesus told Peter, those that take the sword shall perish by it, but functionally that is taking up your cross - Christ died for the sake of others, and the Christian soldier likewise would lay down his life in defence of the defenceless. I feel the Christian ideal is personal pacifism, turning the other cheek, being merciful and forgiving - but if there is a wrong, which is in your power to correct, and you do not do so, that is also unchristian. This is as true when feeding the hungry across your path, as throwing over the tables of the moneychangers, or stopping someone who is attacking someone else. Personal pacifism, but extrapersonal righteous wrath when called for - God is both Jesus on the cross, and the God of Abraham at Mamre before Sodom. It is obviously hard for us to draw the line sometimes - we often know when it is crossed, in massacres and the like; but when nearing it, it is harder to judge. I mean, the Conquistadors ending large-scale human sacrifice is obviously a good thing, even if their conquest was mired by a whole slew of other sins. Jesus threw over the tables of the moneychangers and chased them with whips, but He did not strike them dead as the fig tree. There must be control, and full pacifism is to err to much to one side, as violent massacre is to the other. Any society needs some level of violence to function, to control the base impulses of man and those drawn to them; and we dress them up in legal sanction as police or the army, or admitting involuntarily the mentally ill, but at heart they are justified forms of violence, akin to a necessary operation performed for the health of the whole. Ideally, no one wants to have to resort to the knife, but sometimes it needs to be taken up. It was not Peter's place to do so, but I see no reason to think Cornelius should not. It is the same type of argument as whether or not we should sell all our possessions to help the poor, or when Jesus' feet were balmed with oils. Such problems can be thorny, but violence in its entirety can be both ill or a remedy to cure further ill - the difference between a stabbing in a back alley or a cut in operating theatre.

 

[Paidiske]

I feel the Christian ideal is personal pacifism, turning the other cheek, being merciful and forgiving - but if there is a wrong, which is in your power to correct, and you do not do so, that is also unchristian.

I agree with you up to a point, but think that sometimes the price is too high to correct the wrong. And the taking of life is an extraordinarily high price.

 

[Quid est Veritas?]

If my choice is kill or move, that's a no brainer. Move.

That is not a feasible option for many. Most of the world is already inhabited, and any sizeable move of population is usually opposed. Similarly, you require resources to move or you will simply starve. So especially for the poor, it is often defend yourself or starve to death in a refugee camp.

Even moving doesn't always work. The Boers in South Africa tried that during the Great Trek, to escape British rule and depredations. They negotiated with the Zulu king Dingane for land, which he gave in exchange for help recovering cattle. At the victory feast he had the defenceless leaders rounded up and murdered, and then set out to kill all the settlers that had set out in good faith to claim the land he had promised them. A move might require you to defend, and to kill, even when setting out with peaceable intentions.

 

[Paidiske]

Granted. Moving is not always simple, and I believe I have already argued in the thread that the world must handle the needs of refugees much better. But this is all part of the bigger picture of what must change; it's not enough just to say "no war," we must build a world in which that is sustainable.

 

[Quid est Veritas?]

I agree with you up to a point, but think that sometimes the price is too high to correct the wrong. And the taking of life is an extraordinarily high price.

A life is a high price indeed, but it would be paid regardless - either the blood of Abel or the mark of Cain. No one escapes being wounded or marked by death. War is not a good thing for anyone, especially participants. It is a terrible thing, hence the surgery analogy for a just war. Asking someone to take up the sword, is to ask them to risk dying by it and they do lose innocence themselves. Arthur cannot enter Avalon without asking Bedevere to throw away Excalibur. But war, like sickness, will remain until the Parousia.

it's not enough just to say "no war," we must build a world in which that is sustainable.

Those who desire peace should prepare for war. The longest sustained periods of peace were backed by the mightiest armies the world has known - that is the wisdom of the Pax Romana, or the MAD of the Cold War that kept it so. We must be wise as serpents but innocent as doves, after all. Disarming yourself leads merely to Appeasement when the Wolf comes baring his fangs, and in our fallen world is merely a recipe for further evils. You can disavow violence only in a world safeguarded by the threat thereof. What keeps any peace is the consequences that await if it is broken.

 

[Ignatius the Kiwi]

"Several Church Fathers interpreted Jesus' teachings as advocating nonviolence.[11] For example:

I would note a few observations about these passages from the fathers you found.

Few are explicit rejections in being a universal rejection of the application of violence. Tatian for instance is quite sound in not wishing to be a King, because to be a King is subject oneself to God more so than the average person who does not rule. Kings and Politicians will face a greater degree of scrutiny from God for the power they exercise over others. The Apology of Aristides appears to be the standard approach of Christians in Rome while not addressing the issues we are talking about specifically.

Hippolytus is the most explicit, but perhaps not for the reason within the text you have given. The specific oath that would have been required of a military man is his dedication to Caesar. Hence the problem with Christians serving in a predominantly Pagan army. They would have been tempted to the cult of Mars or the Emperor and this would have been the reinforced culture and religion of military life. It would ask too much of Christians.

Tertullian it wouldn’t surprise me to think this way. But amongst the ante-Nicenes he is perhaps prone to the most excesses. His complete rejection of the heritage of Greece is unacceptable to me and that he later converted to the heresy of Montanism also stains his reputation.

Cyprian doesn’t condemn warfare totally. Only comments on the injustice of the situations they found themselves in at the time. Which isn’t surprising considering the persecution and plague the empire was subject of and too.

Gregory of Nyssa is the most interesting comment but how is his words specifically applied only to war and not anyone else in authority? Church leaders have never been sinless, yet we need leaders to govern a Church. Hopefully they will be humble and that is a trait that is looked for in Chrisitan leadership, though if there is too much humility they will never have the strength to pronounce correct judgements on the congregation. Church discipline is important and if one was always looking at themselves instead of the office they fill, they would never be able to offer or force Church discipline.

Most of these quotes come from people never expected Christianity to become a dominant religion, to completely out do their Pagan adversaries and eclipse it. They probably expected things to continue as normal as is human habit but let’s presume for a moment Christianity naturally continues to outpace paganism in the empire as a natural force without the help of the Emperor. At which point does the Empire become an untenable idea if this idea of never using force is to be maintained? If that were the case it could not be even attempted to be held together or defended. Is there then never any consideration that in a Christian dominated empire that they will need Christian men to defend them and the lives of others? Or must Christians always be perpetual subjects? Must Christians always be poor? Eschew power and never let themselves use these things for the common good? Had those Fathers have considered this possibility and reread the Apostle Paul and considered the implications, it would have stopped them from going too far.

I am not arguing that those individuals were wrong to argue against violent resistance. That is an entirely appropriate Christian thing to do in a context like the Roman Empire which tolerated (for the most part) a Christian presence and didn’t go out of its way to outright destroy Christians. It was enough that if a Christian was found they were to be executed if they didn’t offer sacrifices to Caesar. It was a moral display that both shows Christian restraint and strategic thinking. Not everything has to be solved by force and nor should it be. Things however never remain stagnant and the world of the Roman Empire was distinctly different from the world of Islam or even Communism of our time. Islam for example puts up specific barriers within its word that make missionary work all but impossible; Christian men cannot marry Islamic women, converts to Christianity from Islam are to be killed, Christians are to be given dhimmi status and have their subjugation at the hands of Muslims be known via distinctive clothing and various other practices.

Back to regarding Rome, Barbarians were constantly attacking it, constantly seeking entry into her so that they might establish their own realms. Hence the need for defence. Given the context of many of these writers I do not blame them for not thinking so thoroughly in advance to anticipate a Christian empire. But I do think they are wrong in some of their conclusions. Hence why most Church Fathers of later generations didn’t indulge in complete rejection of arms and relied on the protection of civil authorities. Only they had more confidence in them because they were fellow Christians. They understood the necessity of preserving their communities and people, by arms if needed. I don’t blame them for it.

No governing entity is perfect but at some point Christians were bound to come into secular power. They would know if they had done wrong, if they were part of an army and committed a crime during war, they would know. That is perhaps one of the benefits of Christianity coming into the empire and dominating it as a philosophical outlook. It allowed for the formation of a conscience, at least in sincere Christian soldiers. To restraint. I won’t pretend that the Christian armies were pure or that they committed no crimes. We can however identify crimes they committed as opposed to crimes they didn’t commit. Killing a soldier on the battlefield is not the same thing as killing a non-combatant or raping a peasant woman.

I will note these particular objections for the future but they do not convince me of Christian pacifism because of the Church’s general acceptance of the necessity of arms for most of its history. Also thinking clearly about it, I don’t know how anyone could expect the ancients to hold this view unanimously and subject themselves to every foreign enemy. Christians would have been chased into the ocean or the most desolate places of the world to live in peace. We would have remained a marginal cult on the level of the Samaritans or Zoroastrians.

Think of the latter as an instance of what the world might look like had Christians followed your advice and surrendered entirely to an enemy such as Islam. Zoroastrians at one time dominated Iran, only to be converted to Islam over the centuries. That’s where I think you have this bad understanding of how things operate in the real world.

 

[Ignatius the Kiwi]

How 'bad' is the Roman Empire? The Empire functions in superlatives - they sow salt in Carthage and sack Corinth and run out of wood to crucify fallen Jerusalem - but also, the Pax Romana was the longest period of sustained relative peace in the history of the area, with great strides in the material well-being, health and hygiene of the populace. Rome expanded their franchise, so that eventually everyone was Roman, and felt it. The Greeks called themselves Rhomaioi till the 19th century. Rome co-opted peoples and their leaders, had mechanisms of redress, etc. Cross Rome and she was brutal, but otherwise she was fairly benign - provided you pay your taxes and keep quiet; baring the exceptions that prove the rule, like Prasutagus' daughters' rape or we Christians that kept making trouble in the temples (so as Trajan told Pliny, don't seek them out but prosecute them if brought to you). That is why the Roman persecutions were localised and of short duration, with only the Great Persecution of Diocletian being a serious attempt. If Rome was as serious about stamping out Christianity as they were about Carthage, there would just be martyrs - look at how effectively the Tokugawa could curtail Christianity in Japan, or the Spanish Inquisition Protestantism.

Jesus accepted Rome because Rome was there to create the conditions for the early Church to flourish. Render unto Caesar. There is a world of difference between the Roman Empire in general, and say a state like Nazi Germany or Antiochus IV Epimanes or the Soviets. Direct Roman rule was probably a better option than Herodian rule, I'd wager.

---


My 2 cents on the topic:
1 Samuel 8 tells us about the evils of governments. Nevertheless, people need a 'king' to judge between them, to represent them, to fight battles for them. Humans aren't perfect, and if they were, than any system would be wonderful or no system at all. People do wrong to each other, and such wrongs can only be passively accepted to a point. We are told to love our neighbour as ourself, but if you were attacked, would you not want your neighbour to come to your defence? That is the essence of the old concept of Christian Knighthood - knight being derived from kneg, meaning a servant. It is to serve your fellow man by defending them from the evils of other fellow men. Within that lies all concepts of Just War, as bold action to right wrongs. It is the same kind of thing as an amputation, necessary to save the body as a whole, but a loathsome thing to have to do.

This does not excuse individual action though: Was it right to oppose Nazi Germany militarily? Of course. Does it justify every excess, like firebombing Dresden? Probably not. Similarly, if I rise to defend someone but use excessive force to achieve it, that is itself not laudable. As Jesus told Peter, those that take the sword shall perish by it, but functionally that is taking up your cross - Christ died for the sake of others, and the Christian soldier likewise would lay down his life in defence of the defenceless. I feel the Christian ideal is personal pacifism, turning the other cheek, being merciful and forgiving - but if there is a wrong, which is in your power to correct, and you do not do so, that is also unchristian. This is as true when feeding the hungry across your path, as throwing over the tables of the moneychangers, or stopping someone who is attacking someone else. Personal pacifism, but extrapersonal righteous wrath when called for - God is both Jesus on the cross, and the God of Abraham at Mamre before Sodom. It is obviously hard for us to draw the line sometimes - we often know when it is crossed, in massacres and the like; but when nearing it, it is harder to judge. I mean, the Conquistadors ending large-scale human sacrifice is obviously a good thing, even if their conquest was mired by a whole slew of other sins. Jesus threw over the tables of the moneychangers and chased them with whips, but He did not strike them dead as the fig tree. There must be control, and full pacifism is to err to much to one side, as violent massacre is to the other. Any society needs some level of violence to function, to control the base impulses of man and those drawn to them; and we dress them up in legal sanction as police or the army, or admitting involuntarily the mentally ill, but at heart they are justified forms of violence, akin to a necessary operation performed for the health of the whole. Ideally, no one wants to have to resort to the knife, but sometimes it needs to be taken up. It was not Peter's place to do so, but I see no reason to think Cornelius should not. It is the same type of argument as whether or not we should sell all our possessions to help the poor, or when Jesus' feet were balmed with oils. Such problems can be thorny, but violence in its entirety can be both ill or a remedy to cure further ill - the difference between a stabbing in a back alley or a cut in operating theatre.

I agree with pretty much everything you say here. My point in bringing up how 'bad' the roman empire was is that the typical modern thinks of things through their modern lens. The Roman Empire by contrast to today seems a horrible entity in many respects. If we're speaking from a Christian perspective there were practices that make Rome look even worse, yet as bad as that empire is Jesus accepted it's legitimacy in some degree. He didn't tell us not to pay taxes. He didn't tell soldiers to quit their positions, only that they shouldn't extort people or falsely accuse anyone. Much of the bible seems to make that point about the benefits of a society with law, rules and standards. Hence why Paul warns Christians about why governments have the sword and wield it in such a way to dispense justice.

So many Christians seem aghast at these verses and I would have at one time agreed with many here that the conversion of Constantine to Christianity was a bad thing, in that it corrupted the Church with it coming to secular power. As if the Church could forever stay out of the affairs of the world and not burden herself with it's affairs. Yet that outlook is almost Gnostic in it's orientation, it denies the reality of what will happen if someone else gets power and uses it for their own ends.

I was considering yesterday that if Julian had survived and managed to get a pagan heir, would this have been a boon to Christianity? Julian had already started to repress Christians in his reign and I think any Pagan ruler would have seen with Constantine the dangers of Christianity to their rule and that the Roman response to Christianity at large had been ineffective because of the factors you imagine. Julian's hypothetical pagan successor would have double downed on his Father's policies. They would have tried to snuff Christianity out completely, no mercy and no forgiveness, because they would have understood the trajectory the Empire was going under a Christian Monarch.

 

[Ignatius the Kiwi]

I'm not a Libertarian; I am happy to argue that participation in a society gives us both responsibilities as well as rights. However, I would argue that the legitimate authority of the state has limits, and one of those limits is that it does not have the right to take lives; those of its citizens or those who are not its citizens.

Then law as a function ceases to have value since it cannot ultimately back up that law if it continues to be violated. In such a society one could happily violate the law, refuse imprisonment and do whatever they want. That’s anarchy and it doesn’t and won’t work ever.

I cannot accept the argument that it was worth it. The value of human life far exceeds the political outcome.

Does it? If Lenin, Stalin, Mao and all the Communists had been summarily executed would not the world be a better place if those regimes did not take the reins? No Holodomor, no great leap forward, no many things the Communists did in their effort to make all people equally miserable. In considering only one factor, the value of life, you are ignoring other factors which lead to the sorts of absurdities as allowing evildoers to get away with their actions rather than doing the sensible thing and stopping them, even if it means their death. Had the Germans shot Lenin instead of sending him on a train to Moscow, I think that might have been a more desirable outcome.

We could also consider the most famous Australian this year, Branton Tarrent. If someone had shot and killed him before he slaughtered fifty Muslims that would be a more desirable outcome, no? Or must he be allowed to live freely?

Side note, but in most conflicts, civilian casualties outnumber the deaths of soldiers. Not that the death of soldiers is good either, but one might at least argue that they had chosen that risk.

Is that the case though? It depends on the context and the war in question. One can still condemn mass killing of civilians, looting and raping. It does not follow from that all parts of war are bad or are unneeded.

Because those lives, whether lived under Christian or Muslim rule, had value. And they deserved to be lived in peace, or at least the best peace that could have been managed.

I find this idea of deserving to live in peace contrary to the sort of justifications you are using to say that Christians can never fight back. You expect the Armenians to give up their country, you expect any Christian to give up their lives, possessions and families the moment an aggressor comes along but at the same time suggest that the Muslims who invaded Visigothic Spain deserve Peace? How is this a sane standard?

You would object to the failed Visigothic defence of the Invasion but then turn around and also tell the Christian Kingdom in the North, do not fight back. Then you would tell them that if the Muslims came for Asturias they must surrender there as well and not fight back? The only reason being that their lives are as valuable and precious as Christian lives?

But the Christians also deserve peace in this situation? A peace that Muslims will not respect and have no reason to? You see the absurdity right? Had the Visigothic Kingdom been successful in repelling the Ummayyads those ten million lives would have been lost for different reasons. The Reconquista would have been unnecessary.

If you aren’t going to defend the peace you have, it will never be attainable.

[QUOTE="Paidiske, post: 75633997, member: 386627”] I am also not buying the idea that Islam is some overwhelming evil which is so terrible that it's better to die than live in a Muslim culture. [/QUOTE]

You are born into a Christian village in Toledo, a female peasant. One day a group of raiders come. They kill your parents and take you back to Granada where you will be auctioned and sold. You are sold to be one of the concubines of a local Islamic Magistrate. You are forced to have sex with him and be a part of his Harem. You give birth to your first child and are then told that he will be raised as a Muslim and that under no circumstances will your Christian be allowed to be taught to that Child. You try to teach your child about Christianity and get caught. The Child is taken away from you and you never see him again. You die after your third child. All your descendants and heirs are faithful Muslims, ignorant for the most part of their Mother’s heritage. Your son has risen to prominence and has decided to purchase a Christian concubine for his own harem and the cycle continues.

Perhaps you might not call that evil. Perhaps you would try to respect Islamic law, the teachings of the Quran. Muhammad was a wise man after all and how can an entire people be wrong? For myself I consider such a situation abominable. It offends my sensibilities that a man would think it right to own as many women as he can support as concubines. His polygamy offends me. It offends me that a mother is forced to give birth to a child who will not know of his heritage and be deprived of the Christian faith. It offends me that there are Christians who consider this an acceptable outcome and that this could never be righteously fought against.

[QUOTE="Paidiske, post: 75633997, member: 386627”] I'd argue that the function of the state is to promote the flourishing of its citizens. Which it can't do if it's busy sending them off to be killed. [/QUOTE]

Is it human flourishing to be a Dhimmi in Islamic Spain? What provided more flourishing for the Spanish? The Reconquista or Dhimmitude?

[QUOTE="Paidiske, post: 75633997, member: 386627”] I am open to the possibility that there might not be. But in general, we (as in, western culture) tend to reach for the violent solutions before even considering the peaceful ones, and then we go on to say how good and right and noble our mass killing is! [/QUOTE]

You continue to conflate war with Mass killings. Not distinguishing between the casualties of war and lumping them into the same category. But if you accept ultimately that war is justifiable at some point, how are you a radical pacifist?

[QUOTE="Paidiske, post: 75633997, member: 386627”] At the price of many lives? No, I won't forgive that, or at least, won't give it a free pass. Even if your projected outcomes are accurate, which they may very well not be. [/QUOTE]

You live in Australia. Can you tell me you’re confident of the Spiritual state of it? Of the west in general? Can you guarantee the rights of Armenians to remain Armenians within another country? No? Then why do you recommend they vacate the Middle East? Give their homes to people who hate them and subject themselves to a foreign government not of their own creation?

You would be willing to see the Armenians become non-Christians and non-Armenian based solely on the premise that it is better that they live than are dead. There are times where Christians are expected to die and preventing the death of an entire people and culture is one of those times. Hence why I commend the Armenians for resisting their enemies.

[QUOTE="Paidiske, post: 75633997, member: 386627”] This. This is what I take issue with. Of course it is. Grievously and gravely evil. The deliberate ending of a human life, created unique and precious and loved by God, is always evil. That it may sometimes be necessary does not mean we should shy away from recognising it as the awful evil that it is. [/QUOTE]

Executing Brenton Tarrent would not be evil.

[QUOTE="Paidiske, post: 75633997, member: 386627”] It may be, depending on the form of your "defence." And especially for nations, which are abstract concepts, at best. [/QUOTE]

We’ve already examined one defensive war in our discussion and you seem adamant that it was unnecessary or that it was a bad thing to do. Was Alfred’s defence of Wessex evil?

 

[Paidiske]

Those who desire peace should prepare for war. The longest sustained periods of peace were backed by the mightiest armies the world has known - that is the wisdom of the Pax Romana, or the MAD of the Cold War that kept it so. We must be wise as serpents but innocent as doves, after all. Disarming yourself leads merely to Appeasement when the Wolf comes baring his fangs, and in our fallen world is merely a recipe for further evils. You can disavow violence only in a world safeguarded by the threat thereof. What keeps any peace is the consequences that await if it is broken.

I'm not sure I agree. Wouldn't making sure the wolf has no need to attack be important as well?

I would note a few observations about these passages from the fathers you found....

You're right that each comment needs contextualisation, and I'm not sure that each contributes overall to a strongly pacifist argument (it was a Wikipedia list, after all). My point was simply that Christianity has always had a pacifist strand; it's not a modern liberal invention.

I would have at one time agreed with many here that the conversion of Constantine to Christianity was a bad thing,...

Just for the record, I don't believe I've said this, and if it's been inferred from what I have been saying, it would be something I would want to nuance very carefully. I think some unfortunate things happened for Christianity after Constantine, but that doesn't mean I think his conversion was "a bad thing."

Edited to add: Interesting thing about Constantine, though. He was baptised on his deathbed, at least in part because it was felt that the killing required of him as ruler was incompatible with living as a baptised Christian. Which is an attitude which might give us pause for thought...

Then law as a function ceases to have value since it cannot ultimately back up that law if it continues to be violated. In such a society one could happily violate the law, refuse imprisonment and do whatever they want. That’s anarchy and it doesn’t and won’t work ever.

But that's ridiculous. I live in a country with no death penalty, and one in which its citizens are mostly pretty happily law-abiding, and where imprisonment works when they're not. This idea that it's either death penalty or anarchy is nonsense.

Does it? If Lenin, Stalin, Mao and all the Communists had been summarily executed would not the world be a better place if those regimes did not take the reins? No Holodomor, no great leap forward, no many things the Communists did in their effort to make all people equally miserable. In considering only one factor, the value of life, you are ignoring other factors which lead to the sorts of absurdities as allowing evildoers to get away with their actions rather than doing the sensible thing and stopping them, even if it means their death. Had the Germans shot Lenin instead of sending him on a train to Moscow, I think that might have been a more desirable outcome.

If there had been no Lenin, would someone else have filled that vacuum? Or Stalin, or Mao? Perhaps not in exactly the same way, but the same social forces would have shaped others. Killing an individual actor seldom addresses the underlying problems. But if the powers-that-be had worked to address mass poverty in Russia and China, had worked for the good of those populations, such leaders would never have had the support they did, in the end.

We could also consider the most famous Australian this year, Branton Tarrent. If someone had shot and killed him before he slaughtered fifty Muslims that would be a more desirable outcome, no? Or must he be allowed to live freely?

I can concede the utilitarian argument that the loss of one life is objectively better than the loss of fifty. But if you're intervening before he kills the fifty, why is his death the only possible intervention?

Is that the case though?

It is, and it's something that needs to be taken into account. "War" isn't just a bunch of soldiers killing other soldiers. It's the slaughter and brutalisation of whole populations.

You expect the Armenians to give up their country, you expect any Christian to give up their lives, possessions and families the moment an aggressor comes along but at the same time suggest that the Muslims who invaded Visigothic Spain deserve Peace? How is this a sane standard?

It's exactly the same standard. War is bad, no matter who engages in it. Everybody deserves peace, no matter who they are or what they believe.

A peace that Muslims will not respect and have no reason to? You see the absurdity right?

I see a tendency to dehumanise Muslims and suggest they're all savage brutes who go to war just because. Mostly people go to war for the same sorts of reasons no matter what their faith is.

You are born into a Christian village in Toledo, a female peasant. One day a group of raiders come. They kill your parents and take you back to Granada where you will be auctioned and sold. You are sold to be one of the concubines of a local Islamic Magistrate. You are forced to have sex with him and be a part of his Harem. You give birth to your first child and are then told that he will be raised as a Muslim and that under no circumstances will your Christian be allowed to be taught to that Child. You try to teach your child about Christianity and get caught. The Child is taken away from you and you never see him again. You die after your third child. All your descendants and heirs are faithful Muslims, ignorant for the most part of their Mother’s heritage. Your son has risen to prominence and has decided to purchase a Christian concubine for his own harem and the cycle continues.

Perhaps you might not call that evil. Perhaps you would try to respect Islamic law, the teachings of the Quran. Muhammad was a wise man after all and how can an entire people be wrong? For myself I consider such a situation abominable. It offends my sensibilities that a man would think it right to own as many women as he can support as concubines. His polygamy offends me. It offends me that a mother is forced to give birth to a child who will not know of his heritage and be deprived of the Christian faith. It offends me that there are Christians who consider this an acceptable outcome and that this could never be righteously fought against.

Ironically, you're describing some of the same things I was objecting to in the original thread which sparked this (the subjugation of women etc). Yes, slavery is bad, patriarchy is bad, and so on. These are not peculiarly Muslim evils, although your scenario has a particularly Muslim flavour. It's not as if no one else ever practices slavery, patriarchy or the like.

And I would absolutely support movements to change this (do you know there are Muslim feminists, by the way? It's a fascinating movement within Islam), rather than seeing it as acceptable. I'm just not convinced we have to go to war to do it.

Is it human flourishing to be a Dhimmi in Islamic Spain? What provided more flourishing for the Spanish? The Reconquista or Dhimmitude?

I notice that today, there are no dhimmis, even in Islamic countries. Which suggests that mass conquest is not the only way to address that particular evil.

You continue to conflate war with Mass killings.

That's basically what it is, though.

But if you accept ultimately that war is justifiable at some point, how are you a radical pacifist?

I don't, ultimately.

You live in Australia. Can you tell me you’re confident of the Spiritual state of it? Of the west in general?

I think this is a bizarre question. I think Christians ought to concern themselves with the spiritual state of the Church, and not of nations.

Can you guarantee the rights of Armenians to remain Armenians within another country? No?

Other cultures seem to manage to preserve their language, culture, heritage and religion pretty well. Why should I imagine any other group might not?

Then why do you recommend they vacate the Middle East? Give their homes to people who hate them and subject themselves to a foreign government not of their own creation?

Because that is a better Christian witness than killing them.

You would be willing to see the Armenians become non-Christians and non-Armenian based solely on the premise that it is better that they live than are dead.

I see no reason why they should become non-Christian, and while they would need to some degree to integrate into whichever culture they moved into, they could certainly do so as Armenians.

And yes, better alive than dead, far out!

There are times where Christians are expected to die and preventing the death of an entire people and culture is one of those times.

Martyrdom to prevent the death of others, sure. To prevent the death of a culture? Why? Culture is - from a Christian perspective - adiaphora.

Executing Brenton Tarrent would not be evil.

Of course it would. Even Brenton Tarrant is a bearer of the divine image, and we should treat him as such.

We’ve already examined one defensive war in our discussion and you seem adamant that it was unnecessary or that it was a bad thing to do. Was Alfred’s defence of Wessex evil?

I may not have made myself clear on this point. I consider nations to be abstractions, completely arbitrary and, while useful from an administrative point of view, pretty meaningless from a spiritual point of view. And in that sense, abstractions which do not have the slightest value in comparison to actual human lives. If Alfred was prepared to kill - or see others killed - to defend the particular abstract concept called "Wessex," that was evil, yes, because God doesn't care one whit about "Wessex," but God sure cared about those human beings.

 

[zippy2006]

My 2 cents on the topic:
1 Samuel 8 tells us about the evils of governments. Nevertheless, people need a 'king' to judge between them, to represent them, to fight battles for them. Humans aren't perfect, and if they were, than any system would be wonderful or no system at all. People do wrong to each other, and such wrongs can only be passively accepted to a point. We are told to love our neighbour as ourself, but if you were attacked, would you not want your neighbour to come to your defence? That is the essence of the old concept of Christian Knighthood - knight being derived from kneg, meaning a servant. It is to serve your fellow man by defending them from the evils of other fellow men. Within that lies all concepts of Just War, as bold action to right wrongs. It is the same kind of thing as an amputation, necessary to save the body as a whole, but a loathsome thing to have to do.

This does not excuse individual action though: Was it right to oppose Nazi Germany militarily? Of course. Does it justify every excess, like firebombing Dresden? Probably not. Similarly, if I rise to defend someone but use excessive force to achieve it, that is itself not laudable. As Jesus told Peter, those that take the sword shall perish by it, but functionally that is taking up your cross - Christ died for the sake of others, and the Christian soldier likewise would lay down his life in defence of the defenceless. I feel the Christian ideal is personal pacifism, turning the other cheek, being merciful and forgiving - but if there is a wrong, which is in your power to correct, and you do not do so, that is also unchristian. This is as true when feeding the hungry across your path, as throwing over the tables of the moneychangers, or stopping someone who is attacking someone else. Personal pacifism, but extrapersonal righteous wrath when called for - God is both Jesus on the cross, and the God of Abraham at Mamre before Sodom. It is obviously hard for us to draw the line sometimes - we often know when it is crossed, in massacres and the like; but when nearing it, it is harder to judge. I mean, the Conquistadors ending large-scale human sacrifice is obviously a good thing, even if their conquest was mired by a whole slew of other sins. Jesus threw over the tables of the moneychangers and chased them with whips, but He did not strike them dead as the fig tree. There must be control, and full pacifism is to err to much to one side, as violent massacre is to the other. Any society needs some level of violence to function, to control the base impulses of man and those drawn to them; and we dress them up in legal sanction as police or the army, or admitting involuntarily the mentally ill, but at heart they are justified forms of violence, akin to a necessary operation performed for the health of the whole. Ideally, no one wants to have to resort to the knife, but sometimes it needs to be taken up. It was not Peter's place to do so, but I see no reason to think Cornelius should not. It is the same type of argument as whether or not we should sell all our possessions to help the poor, or when Jesus' feet were balmed with oils. Such problems can be thorny, but violence in its entirety can be both ill or a remedy to cure further ill - the difference between a stabbing in a back alley or a cut in operating theatre.

Great points, Quid. I especially like your warning against oversimplifying Christianity by focusing only on one aspect. This quote is to the point:

What may be called linear thinking goes straight out from one pole or from one idea of the cosmos of ideas, which every true philosophy is. This idea, cut off from its interrelations and interdependencies with the cosmos, it then fanatically thinks to a finish. Thus it becomes radical individualism or socialism or totalitarianism or anarchism. This linear thinking, so characteristic of the modern mind and its countless isms, is a stranger to Catholic political philosophy. For Catholic political philosophy is ‘spheric’ thinking. Of the interdependencies and the mutual relations between ideas as united in a spheric cosmos and the concordance of these, spheric thinking must be always aware. This explains the unity in diversity, the conservative perseverance in principles and the flexible progressiveness, promoted by the disputes of the schools, in the application of the identical principles in a ceaselessly changing life.

-Heinrich Rommen​

 

[Quid est Veritas?]

I agree with pretty much everything you say here. My point in bringing up how 'bad' the roman empire was is that the typical modern thinks of things through their modern lens. The Roman Empire by contrast to today seems a horrible entity in many respects. If we're speaking from a Christian perspective there were practices that make Rome look even worse, yet as bad as that empire is Jesus accepted it's legitimacy in some degree. He didn't tell us not to pay taxes. He didn't tell soldiers to quit their positions, only that they shouldn't extort people or falsely accuse anyone. Much of the bible seems to make that point about the benefits of a society with law, rules and standards. Hence why Paul warns Christians about why governments have the sword and wield it in such a way to dispense justice.

So many Christians seem aghast at these verses and I would have at one time agreed with many here that the conversion of Constantine to Christianity was a bad thing, in that it corrupted the Church with it coming to secular power. As if the Church could forever stay out of the affairs of the world and not burden herself with it's affairs. Yet that outlook is almost Gnostic in it's orientation, it denies the reality of what will happen if someone else gets power and uses it for their own ends.

I was considering yesterday that if Julian had survived and managed to get a pagan heir, would this have been a boon to Christianity? Julian had already started to repress Christians in his reign and I think any Pagan ruler would have seen with Constantine the dangers of Christianity to their rule and that the Roman response to Christianity at large had been ineffective because of the factors you imagine. Julian's hypothetical pagan successor would have double downed on his Father's policies. They would have tried to snuff Christianity out completely, no mercy and no forgiveness, because they would have understood the trajectory the Empire was going under a Christian Monarch.

Julian was too late. Most conversions of peoples have a monarch who converts, a pagan backlash, then final conversion. In Northumbria the Christian Edwin was succeeded by Pagans, Haakon Siggurdson in Norway, Aedbald in Kent, Boleslaus of Bohemia temporarily, the Christian Olga followed by pagan Sviatopolk in Kiev before Vladimir, etc.

The fact of the matter is that Christianity was already increasing exponentially prior to Constantine's Edict at Milan, which was why Galerius had Diocletian take such a hard line to it. Roman paganism was ill-equipped to handle it, in spite of attempts from figures like Varro around Iovis. This is why mystery religions had such a cachet in the Empire; and why under the tetrachy or Aurelian, there were attempts toward a more monotheistic or monolatric pagan cult of the sun. Julian himself did not espouse a freewheeling Paganism, but a Neoplatonic allegoric interpretation too, that would be a hard sell to replace Christianity. In his own day he didn't outlaw Christianity, but attempted to restore civic paganism and Paganise the ruling classes again, while fostering dissent amongst the Christians. The heyday of the big Pagan sacrifices were over, and Paganism was not a monolithic block, but communal special interest groups around Isis or so, with most large temples already in decay. His success was more to the Arian sympathy of Constantius II that had weakened the faith, than a well-spring of Paganism to tap into.

If Julian survived, then the result would have been a more gradual conversion - which was anyway far more gradual than people realise. Afterall, the proconsul of Africa in Augustine's day was still a Pagan, and when Belisarius defended Rome they still celebrated the Lupercalia. But the writing was on the wall. The late Empire's state cults were dead, and the question was which religion would replace it - Mithraism, or Serapis/Isis, or Jupiter Dolicenus, or Christianity. Attempts to establish Neoplatonic interpretations show that even Pagan intellectuals did not take their gods seriously, essentially trying to explain them away as abstractions or thyurgic practice. Christianity was best equipped to supplant the rest in this intellectual climate, with the Incarnation and redemption playing to the salvific desire in the mystery religions. The rapidity at which Jovian reestablished Christian supremacy shows this - without the Flavian legitimacy and personal popularity of Julian, it was untenable not to. Theodosius' coup de grace to the old state cults would likely have just been delayed by a generation or two, if Julian had established a dynasty. The lasting effect it might have had would be on Judaism, as his rebuilding of the Temple would have greatly affected it and altered the relationship to Christianity.

It was too late to attempt to 'snuff out' Christianity. Julian was merely trying to drive it out of the ruling classes. The Great Persecution of Diocletian was probably already too late to snuff it out, and the Christian populace would always be there as a potential power bloc that could be exploited by someone seeking the purple. Julian's apostasy harmed his rule, and like Akhenaton or Cult of Reason, was short-lived once its real adherents were removed. The advantage of accommodation with the reality on the ground was too much for their successors. Even Julian's pagans weren't universal supporters, as he alienated Antioch, one of the great cities of the Empire; and his ascetic and intellectual lifestyle was ill-suited to the Dominate style of rule expected by most Pagans. It is fun to speculate on the counter-factual, but the tide of history was already against Julian. He was making powerful enemies, both religiously and in the curia, and force of arms was a common way people ascended to the purple at that stage, as he did himself. Further, Ammianus said Julian tried to avoid sexual intercourse, and he never remarried after his wife died. His chance of establishing a dynasty looks slim. His idolation of Hadrian and Marcus Aurelius looks like he was intending some sort of adoptive successor, and he was decentralising power throughout - the end result would have likely been a new round of civil wars or fracturing of the Empire, as Julian was no Diocletian to make it work, and even the latter couldn't get succession to work right.

 

[Quid est Veritas?]

I may not have made myself clear on this point. I consider nations to be abstractions, completely arbitrary and, while useful from an administrative point of view, pretty meaningless from a spiritual point of view. And in that sense, abstractions which do not have the slightest value in comparison to actual human lives. If Alfred was prepared to kill - or see others killed - to defend the particular abstract concept called "Wessex," that was evil, yes, because God doesn't care one whit about "Wessex," but God sure cared about those human beings.

Countries aren't complete arbitrary abstractions. They are expressions of commonalities of the humans they contain, and as such, socio-cultural units of humanity. The survival of uniqueness in the North of England, or the maintainance of Scottishness are clear examples of this. You can even trace ideas and language forms and foods by such lines, even within modern nations. Look how Islam tracks fairly well onto Hamito-Semitic languages vs Indo-European ones in the Mediterranean basin. There are real differences of expression and perception, between the British and the French or the Irish say. Immigrant countries like Australia or Canada makes it hard to realise this sometimes, but arbitrary lines on paper often reflect crudely real divisions in practice.

But that was not his point, I'd wager. He was asking whether Alfred should have defended Anglo-Saxon peoples from the onslaught of murderous Danes that raped and pillaged and tortured their way over the Island. It is the same question if we should have just let Hitler kill the Jews, while tut-tuting in disapproval. Alfred represents the real juxtaposition of Civilisation vs Barbarism, which is a real thing, even if we muddy it by calling every tribe a 'civilisation' nowadays. In WWI the Germans were called Huns, as they were accused of failing the standard of being civilised by raping Belgium. The concept has been much abused, and misused in Colonial times, but people can be civilised or barbarians no matter their background. For a king to passively accept the destruction of his kingdom, makes him a bad king who failed those entrusted to his care. Even Hezekiah who trusted ultimately in the Lord, fortified Jerusalem.

I'm not sure I agree. Wouldn't making sure the wolf has no need to attack be important as well?

Humans are fallen. There are always wolves. Appeasement of wolves does not work. Alfred built fortified burhs to discourage attack - peace is always well-armed, and our post-War peace has only been maintained by NATO and great power rivalry. The league of Nations and the UN have both failed in this regard, and the idea that we can negotiate or create a status quo of absolute peace is laughable - all states of peace are in various forms of decay, and conflict is universal and inevitable so long as people have differences of opinion or desires.

 

[Ignatius the Kiwi]

You're right that each comment needs contextualisation, and I'm not sure that each contributes overall to a strongly pacifist argument (it was a Wikipedia list, after all). My point was simply that Christianity has always had a pacifist strand; it's not a modern liberal invention.

If we’re talking about strains I can admit there have always been those within the Church who never fought back, who in the face of danger preferred death to hurting others. Sometimes that was the appropriate response. If a leader could save others of his community by dying, as happened to many Church authorities in the Roman Empire, their example is to be commended. As are the examples of many men and women in later generations.

Yet there have always been military men in the Church, even in the New Testament when certain Centurions were converted to Christ and it would appear difficult to believe that a situation never arose between 33 AD and 312 AD where a Christian never defended another Christian from an unjust action or assault. There has also necessarily been since the Christian assumption of secular power the need for armies and the necessity to defend others. Especially in an ancient context, which if we belong to a Church which claims antiquity we ought to reconcile to ourselves. Catholics have to reconcile the Crusades. Orthodox have to reconcile the Eastern Roman Empire and Kievan Rus/Russia. Protestants even have to reconcile the thirty years war to themselves.

The problem I see with your view is that it is an excess, much in way the Mongols had an excessive view of warfare and viewed any slight as a reason to invade, kill the masses and subjugate the rest. The radical pacifism you have presented appears to be the opposite, except instead of being murderous it is suicidal and for no good reason. It insists on never resisting, on handing everything to the person who demands it and lacks a sense of justice.

It’s a theological excess, not grounded in particularly solid biblical reasoning nor in the Church’s tradition over two thousand years, nor in a good philosophical justification. When I think of what the consequences would have been had your theology been practiced, I can say with reasonable certainty Christianity would have remained a marginal cult, if it even survived to be practiced today.

Just for the record, I don't believe I've said this, and if it's been inferred from what I have been saying, it would be something I would want to nuance very carefully. I think some unfortunate things happened for Christianity after Constantine, but that doesn't mean I think his conversion was "a bad thing."

Edited to add: Interesting thing about Constantine, though. He was baptised on his deathbed, at least in part because it was felt that the killing required of him as ruler was incompatible with living as a baptised Christian. Which is an attitude which might give us pause for thought...

With Constantine’s conversion he inherited an Empire. That came with an inherited legal system, Armies and the Emperors decision to favour particular people/ideas over others. Constantine’s conversion furthered the advancement of Christianization when he sought to keep Christianity unified during the crisis of Arianism, outlawed practices like Crucifixion and gave patronage to Bishops.

This all involved things that go against your principles. The Use of force to compel others. The use of armies to secure his rule (Constantine fought under the cross and believed God had given him victory over Maxentius at the Milvian Bridge).

Constantine’s conversion marked the point at which Christians accepted that it was permissible to have secular power. At which point they further accepted the use of the sword, in cases of war and in cases of justice. As a radical pacifist, which I think you have defined as being opposed to the force to compel and killing period, how is the conversion of Constantine not an utter tragedy for the Church? A complete betrayal of the idea of Christianity as you understand it?

Hence why I think there’s no reconciliation between yourself and the Christian past. There’s only repudiation, unless you’re willing to amend your pacifism to be a personal choice but not necessary for others to follow. Much in the way monasticism is a personal choice for the Christian but not necessary.

But that's ridiculous. I live in a country with no death penalty, and one in which its citizens are mostly pretty happily law-abiding, and where imprisonment works when they're not. This idea that it's either death penalty or anarchy is nonsense.

If I disobey enough laws in Australia and resist arrest, the police will rightfully kill me if they cannot imprison me. Same as any country. It doesn’t matter that they don’t enforce the death penalty (wrongfully in my opinion), what matters is that you live and accept that system for what it is.

If you argue that the police do not have the authority to kill anyone, then that is proposing anarchy/libertarianism since punishment cannot be ultimately enforced.

If there had been no Lenin, would someone else have filled that vacuum? Or Stalin, or Mao? Perhaps not in exactly the same way, but the same social forces would have shaped others. Killing an individual actor seldom addresses the underlying problems. But if the powers-that-be had worked to address mass poverty in Russia and China, had worked for the good of those populations, such leaders would never have had the support they did, in the end.

Or, on the Alternative, if the Whites had won in the civil war by killing every Marxist/Communist, Russia might have had a very different history. If we had to choose who we favour winning in a war we can actually pick sides in order to demonstrate a positive effect. The White Army winning, is probably more preferable for the people of Ukraine and all those men and women sent to Gulags in Siberia. Same way as shooting Lenin in the head might have prevented him from organizing his party and dominating Russia.

It's exactly the same standard. War is bad, no matter who engages in it. Everybody deserves peace, no matter who they are or what they believe.

War is bad, therefore you have no right to defend yourself in a war from an aggressor? I’m curious if you think this sort of logic will stop the aggressor in any war from perpetuating the acts they desire. I can agree with the premise that war is bad and undesirable. It doesn't follow from that observation that the defender is wrong to participate in that war in defense of their home/people/way of life.

Ironically, you're describing some of the same things I was objecting to in the original thread which sparked this (the subjugation of women etc). Yes, slavery is bad, patriarchy is bad, and so on. These are not peculiarly Muslim evils, although your scenario has a particularly Muslim flavour. It's not as if no one else ever practices slavery, patriarchy or the like.

And I would absolutely support movements to change this (do you know there are Muslim feminists, by the way? It's a fascinating movement within Islam), rather than seeing it as acceptable. I'm just not convinced we have to go to war to do it.

Why do you think Slavery in the Islamic world is less of a problem? It’s due to international pressure by nations that want to abolish slavery in all its forms. If those Islamic countries didn’t have at least laws on paper declaring the illegality of the slave trade the European powers would not tolerate it. International pressure was brought to bare down on many countries in the world. Many countries didn't give up slavery without compulsion by others. Many countries today won't enforce those laws because no one is compelling them too.

My particular scenario was to point that you have problems with the Christians during the time of Reconquista fighting against that idea of Islam. You’ve justified it by saying that Christians had slaves, the difference being is that most of us have repudiated that aspect of the past. Slavery for the most part died naturally in Europe to be replaced by serfdom and came back through the inspiration of Islam on the Spanish who saw the economic benefits of cheap labour. It was was a reverse inspiration and a horrible mistake by Spain and Europeans at the time.

The Idea of Feminism arising naturally within Islam is also laughable. Feminist Muslims don’t derive their ideas from historic Islam but are more influenced by secular enlightenment thinking like so many ‘Christian feminists’ are.

I notice that today, there are no dhimmis, even in Islamic countries. Which suggests that mass conquest is not the only way to address that particular evil.

Islam conquered Egypt in the 650s. The majority of the population was Coptic Christian. They have been subjected Dhimmi status for about 1370 or so years? What did that involve? You paid less taxes if you converted to Islam. If a Muslim man married a Christian girl her children were raised as Muslim. If a Christian woman converted to Islam she could divorce her Christian husband without any problems. Christians could not display their faith in public and crosses on the outside of Churches should be removed. So hmm, I agree. Maybe there is a reason there are less Dhimmis in Egypt today than in the 700s. Those Egyptians who resisted Islamic rule early on, they were the immoral ones. It's never worth the cost of fighting. Better an Islamic Egypt than a single person die defending their Christian civilization. (Am I take this sort of stance seriously?)

Most Islamic nations have also had constitutions based on European understanding of law forced upon them. So yeah, no wonder there are less Dhimmis. Because Islam lost militarily to the west and they’ve had centuries to convert their populations away from their native faiths to Islam. But the Reconquista was wrong to resist this. It wasn’t worth the cost.

 

[Paidiske]

Protestants even have to reconcile the thirty years war to themselves.

I still don't understand this idea that just because one belongs to a particular group, we have to "reconcile" something other people in that group did. I have no problem saying people in my "group" were wrong.

The problem I see with your view is that it is an excess, much in way the Mongols had an excessive view of warfare and viewed any slight as a reason to invade, kill the masses and subjugate the rest. The radical pacifism you have presented appears to be the opposite, except instead of being murderous it is suicidal and for no good reason. It insists on never resisting, on handing everything to the person who demands it and lacks a sense of justice.

And the problem I have with your view is that you seem to view human life far too cheaply. It seems to be, finally, a difference in values; for you, something like a nation or an ideology can justify killing, and for me, it can't.

For what it's worth, though, I am not arguing for "never resisting." I am arguing in this thread very specifically that war is wrong. There are other forms of resistance.

Constantine’s conversion marked the point at which Christians accepted that it was permissible to have secular power. At which point they further accepted the use of the sword, in cases of war and in cases of justice. As a radical pacifist, which I think you have defined as being opposed to the force to compel and killing period, how is the conversion of Constantine not an utter tragedy for the Church? A complete betrayal of the idea of Christianity as you understand it?

I am certainly opposed to the use of force to compel on an individual level, although I think there's a place for it at the state level. I am not arguing that it is wrong to have - and use - secular power. I am arguing that some of the common uses of secular power - warfare chief among them - are actually abuses of that power.

That said, first, Constantine's conversion is good for his sake. I know some question whether it was a genuine conversion or a political move, but assuming that it was, to some degree, genuine, conversion to Christianity is inherently a good thing.

And second, Christians having power is not inherently a bad thing. It gives us scope to proclaim the good news, to teach, baptise and nurture communities of faith, to respond to the needs of our communities, to transform injustice, and so on. That many Christians down the centuries have misused power does not negate that many have also used power well. Power in itself is not the problem.

Hence why I think there’s no reconciliation between yourself and the Christian past. There’s only repudiation, unless you’re willing to amend your pacifism to be a personal choice but not necessary for others to follow. Much in the way monasticism is a personal choice for the Christian but not necessary.

I pondered that, but I don't see how "not killing" can be a personal choice rather than a universal Christian imperative. To voluntarily kill another human being is to have utterly failed in the second of the two great commandments.

If I disobey enough laws in Australia and resist arrest, the police will rightfully kill me if they cannot imprison me. Same as any country. It doesn’t matter that they don’t enforce the death penalty (wrongfully in my opinion), what matters is that you live and accept that system for what it is.

If you argue that the police do not have the authority to kill anyone, then that is proposing anarchy/libertarianism since punishment cannot be ultimately enforced.

Police won't kill you here unless they believe you're threatening someone else's life. Our rate of police deaths is extremely low (deaths in custody being a separate issue). Our system does not rely on the threat of death for punishment, for which I'm very grateful.

War is bad, therefore you have no right to defend yourself in a war from an aggressor? I’m curious if you think this sort of logic will stop the aggressor in any war from perpetuating the acts they desire. I can agree with the premise that war is bad and undesirable. It doesn't follow from that observation that the defender is wrong to participate in that war in defense of their home/people/way of life.

War is bad, therefore avoid participating in it if at all possible. If someone has a choice between killing lots of people (even in defence of something) and not, then choose not. Don't perpetuate the cycle. Find other means of dealing with the aggressor.

Why do you think Slavery in the Islamic world is less of a problem? It’s due to international pressure by nations that want to abolish slavery in all its forms.

So, something other than warfare produced a desirable social change? How... radical.

The Idea of Feminism arising naturally within Islam is also laughable. Feminist Muslims don’t derive their ideas from historic Islam but are more influenced by secular enlightenment thinking like so many ‘Christian feminists’ are.

It's a fascinating movement. Modern Islamic feminism is traced back to a 19th-century Qur'anic scholar. Her last words before her execution in 1852 were: "You can kill me as soon as you like, but you cannot stop the emancipation of women." At that point, first-wave feminism was only just beginning to be articulated in the west.

Sure, Islamic feminism is in dialogue with other forms of feminism, but it is also deeply in dialogue with Islamic texts, traditions and discourse. I suspect it has far more hope of transforming some of the more problematic aspects of Islam than armed conflict with others.

Those Egyptians who resisted Islamic rule early on, they were the immoral ones. .... (Am I take this sort of stance seriously?)

Why do you keep falsely treating my rejection of war as a rejection of resistance? It is a misrepresentation of my argument.

 

[Ignatius the Kiwi]

I still don't understand this idea that just because one belongs to a particular group, we have to "reconcile" something other people in that group did. I have no problem saying people in my "group" were wrong.

If you do not hold the historic Church, which Anglicans claim to be part of, as important then I suppose I understand how you might not care about this issue. If I were going to be a Mormon I might care to know about how they considered black people incapable of the priesthood and at least try to reconcile myself with that. In your case you have a Church which has cooperated with civil authorities in many violations of modern liberal values you seem to espouse.

Of course, I take a broader view of not just Orthodoxy’s relationship with war but all of Christendom. I see how warfare has been abused and has benefitted the Church. In the case of the latter, I would ask, could you at least admit that Christianity has benefitted from warfare? You might think it appalling but it is the truth.

And the problem I have with your view is that you seem to view human life far too cheaply. It seems to be, finally, a difference in values; for you, something like a nation or an ideology can justify killing, and for me, it can't.

Human life isn’t cheap, hence why war has been a necessity a bunch of times. Human life goes beyond merely being alive to actually living it out. Hence I don’t understand how you can’t see how the Reconquista or resisting a force like Islam wasn’t justified.

For what it's worth, though, I am not arguing for "never resisting." I am arguing in this thread very specifically that war is wrong. There are other forms of resistance.

You expect an entire nation of Christian Armenians to vacate their nation and leave it to Muslims. You condemn Christians for preventing the Islamization of Europe by preventing them from entering it for hundreds of years. How is this in any way resistance?

For I am certainly opposed to the use of force to compel on an individual level, although I think there's a place for it at the state level. I am not arguing that it is wrong to have - and use - secular power. I am arguing that some of the common uses of secular power - warfare chief among them - are actually abuses of that power.

You make an exception here for the use of force by secular power. Why then is wrong for secular power to engage in warfare, in particular in the defence of their citizens when you justify secular power executing someone under certain circumstances? You’ve developed your Ideas part of the way but are unable to reach the basic conclusion of what it takes to necessarily run a state, especially in a Christian context.

Why is wrong for the Armenian Military to resist Turkish and Azerbaijani occupation of Armenia. While it’s okay for the Armenian government to force their citizens to do things they might not necessarily want to do, like pay taxes. Explain to me.

hat said, first, Constantine's conversion is good for his sake. I know some question whether it was a genuine conversion or a political move, but assuming that it was, to some degree, genuine, conversion to Christianity is inherently a good thing.


And second, Christians having power is not inherently a bad thing. It gives us scope to proclaim the good news, to teach, baptise and nurture communities of faith, to respond to the needs of our communities, to transform injustice, and so on. That many Christians down the centuries have misused power does not negate that many have also used power well. Power in itself is not the problem.

That power included the use of arms. Which is what we’re primarily concerned with here. It forever changed the dynamic between how Christians view military matters, instead of mostly being apart from it, Christians were required to be in it to maintain the state. This is part of the consequence of Christians have secular power and if warfare is utterly impermissible, why should Constantine’s assumption of such power be considered a neutral or good thing?

I pondered that, but I don't see how "not killing" can be a personal choice rather than a universal Christian imperative. To voluntarily kill another human being is to have utterly failed in the second of the two great commandments.

Then Christians cannot be part of the military, they cannot be in the police, they cannot defend others and they cannot resist an evildoer if the evildoer demands their life. They especially cannot assume power in a secular state that uses such means and controls the lives of people.

That’s what I mean by personal choice. Some Christian laymen take on task of being a police officer despite knowing it could end their lives or force them to end the lives of others. You might carve out an exception but then you’re moving further and further away from your radical pacifist position which is don’t kill anyone period for any reason.

You’ve already done this in the case of Brentan Tarrent and said it would be justifiable to kill him before he killed fifty Muslims. Maybe you could then consider why Christians historically thought it necessary to kill others in the historical scenarios we’ve been talking about.

Police won't kill you here unless they believe you're threatening someone else's life. Our rate of police deaths is extremely low (deaths in custody being a separate issue). Our system does not rely on the threat of death for punishment, for which I'm very grateful.

I don’t pay tax in New Zealand, refuse to give up my house, refuse to go to jail and refuse every which way to acknowledge the government, they will at some point kill me. They might not want to, they might even be hesitant about it, but they will in the end kill me, if I resist enough. Same goes for Australia, USA and any other western nation. You denying this reality doesn’t mean a thing.

Regarding the death penalty in a purely sarcastic way. It’s a relief that in Australia and New Zealand that a man like Orlando Hall can escape the death penalty. He didn’t deserve such a punishment after kidnapping a teenage girl, raping her repeatedly, then burying her alive after beating her over the head with a shovel and soaking her in gasoline. Men like him deserve life and if anyone dares suggest that he be killed for his crimes, well they’re just as bad as he was. The United States should be ashamed for executing him.

War is bad, therefore avoid participating in it if at all possible. If someone has a choice between killing lots of people (even in defence of something) and not, then choose not. Don't perpetuate the cycle. Find other means of dealing with the aggressor.

Like giving him everything he wants? Obeying his laws and demands? Again. This isn’t realistic.

So, something other than warfare produced a desirable social change? How... radical.

International pressure backed by military might. Why would the Islamic nations listen western countries without the implicit threat of military intervention? I might prefer the Islamic nations be left to themselves but at the same time if the world did that do you think there would be any protections for minorities in those nations?

I would also like your response to the point I made about Dhimitude. You seemed to imply the reasons Dhimmis as a legal concept disappeared within Islamic countries is due to self-development within Islam regarding non-Muslims. Also I would like you to address that gradual conversion of the Egyptians to Islam from Christianity and explain how them being peaceful (for the most part) benefitted the Copts of Egypt. They lost their nation, their heritage and are now a minority in their own land, subject to the whims of whomever is in charge. Thank God it’s not the Muslim Brotherhood now but who knows what will happen in the future.

Because I brought the example of the crusade for Egypt in my first post. Would it have been worse, had the Crusaders actually won that war?

Why do you keep falsely treating my rejection of war as a rejection of resistance? It is a misrepresentation of my argument.

Because you suggested that the Armenians duty as Christians was to run away from their homeland. They have no right to expect to live there peacefully and therefore they should migrate elsewhere. How is that resistance instead of capitulation?

 

[prodromos]

Why do you keep falsely treating my rejection of war as a rejection of resistance? It is a misrepresentation of my argument.

Maybe you should stop falsely characterising your opponents as having a cheap view of human life.