Introduction
This paper was
written for the Ridley Institute. See Ridley Papers, No. 3 (December, 2024); RWP
No. 3. Grams, Church and State Relations
To answer the
question, ‘What is the purpose of government?’ provides some answers to the
question, ‘What is the purpose of the Church?’
Indeed, in the Old Testament, the people of God were the state, the
palace and the temple were interrelated, and the government was a
theocracy. The prophetic notion of a
kingdom of God emerged in criticism of the failures of both the palace and the
temple, and its fulfillment in Jesus’ ministry produced the distinction of
Church and state.
In this paper, I
propose to explore three proposals for the purpose of government. They produce different lines of thought about
the state and therefore the Church’s relationship to it, but they are not
irreconcilable proposals. The paper is
offered to inform readers of various suggestions within the three proposals,
which are that government exists for
1. The Protection of Privacy: The role of government is to protect the freedoms of people in society.
2. Moral Formation: The role of government is to create a better society by making people live with good values.
3. Punitive Purposes: The role of government is to remove people in society who support bad values.
Scripture
provides different views on the purpose of government, and yet it has a certain
trajectory for how to understand the purpose of government as we move from the
Old to the New Testament. To be sure,
the Bible provides no warrant for a particular form of government. Yet it does provide certain perspectives on
government in light of God’s reign over His creation and the role of His people
in salvation history.
Relevance of the Study
This study is
relevant in our times. The Western
nations have moved away from a Christian basis for morals, justice, and society
as a whole. At the same time, European
nations have seen a major influx of Islamic migrants that challenge
long-standing views on the Church and State relationship. Furthermore, the established state Churches
in Europe and the United Kingdom (e.g., the Church of England) have, to a large
extent, relinquished their definitive role in society by rejecting historic
Christian teaching on faith and practice in many aspects. Both society and government continuously
reject and even persecute Christians.[1] Non-Western nations are pressured by Western
nations to adopt secular forms of government and teach their emerging,
post-Christian values. Many also have
the challenge of the spread of Islam, sometimes by violence (e.g., Nigeria).
First Proposal: The role of government is to protect
the freedoms of people in society.
The first
proposal is that government should play the role of protecting individuals from
others—including the government itself.
This view defends the right to private property and understands
government to play a limited role.
The Roman
statesman, Marcus Tullius Cicero’s (1st c. BC), understood the
state’s origin as a natural growth
out of human relationships. One might
contrast this view with the more autocratic view in the Ancient Near East,
where the ruler ruled at the gods’ direction to exclude chaos and impose order
on his subjects.[2] The Old Testament understanding of government
fits within this perspective, yet, with its pastoral, patriarchal heritage, was
based on the natural relationships of family, clan, and tribe.
For Cicero, the
first relational bond leading eventually to government is the natural bonds of
husband and wife, parents and children, and the home, where everything was
shared in common. He claimed that this
familial unit was the ‘nursery of the state’.
Beyond the home were other familial relationships brothers and sisters,
cousins, and relationships established through marriage. Cementing these
relationships further were traditions and religious devotions:
The bonds
of common blood hold men fast through good-will and affection; for it means
much to share in common the same family traditions, the same forms of domestic
worship, and the same ancestral tombs (Cicero, De Officiis 1.54).[3]
Given this origin
of the state in natural, a government’s role is to protect these units and
honor their traditions and religious devotions.
It was especially important that it protected private property:
... the chief purpose in the establishment of constitutional state
and municipal governments was that individual property rights might be secured.
For, although it was by Nature's guidance that men were drawn together into
communities, it was in the hope of safeguarding their possessions that they
sought the protection of cities (De
Officiis II.73).
Government was
also to assure ‘an abundance of the necessities of life’ for its citizens
(II.74), and ‘strive, too, by whatever means they can, in peace or in war, to
advance the state in power, in territory, and in revenues’ (II.85). This perspective might be phrased as
‘government for the people’. He opposed
Roman imperialism, but he argued that a government should seek the benefits of
its own citizens first.
The Old
Testament also established laws protecting private property, with two such laws
in the Ten Commandments. The prohibition
against stealing and that against coveting one’s neighbor’s property contradict
the attempt by some to find a Marxist interpretation in Scripture that opposes
ownership of private property.[4] The expansion of government authority from
judges to kings was viewed negatively: it was a rejection of God’s rule and
meant military conscription, palace servants and acquisition of land and
assets, and the expansion of slavery (1 Samuel 8.1-18). King Rehoboam rejected the notion of
government serving the people for that of the people serving the king (1 Kings
12). This led to civil war and a
division of Israel into the northern and southern kingdoms.
In the modern
era, John Locke (1632-1704) agreed with Cicero that governmental authority was
based in nature and under God. For him,
natural law provided protection of life, liberty, and property. Civil governments passed positive laws that
ought to be based on natural law (Two
Treatises 2.12). If a government
created or broke laws against natural law, the people had just cause to
overthrow it (2.212-17).
Modern views of government are
more likely based on a contractual understanding of the state. Neither natural bonds nor a divine mandate
justify ‘rights’ or the state, but humans come together and to form a contract
for a governing authority. Thomas Hobbes
(1588-1679) was significant in the defense of this view. He gave three reasons for forming a social
contract: human competition, diffidence (distrust), and desire for glory. These, then, are the basis for state
formation: ‘The
first, maketh man invade for Gain; the second, for Safety [the need for
defense], and the third, for Reputation’ (Leviathan
13.62).[5] Hobbes’ negative view of human motivations,
reinforced by the destruction of the English Civil War in the 1600s, led him to
support rule by an absolute sovereign.
This meant, among other things, the right of the king over anyone’s
claim to private property. The state of
nature was not positive but negative, and a sovereign needed to rule his people
with absolute power for their own good.
The people, for their part, submit to such a social contract for
protection from others.
The American
founding fathers rejected Hobbes’ defense of a king but accepted the idea that
government is a social contract. They
turned to Locke for the idea that government was under God and that it existed
to assure natural rights given by God.
Government was to be by the people, of the people, and for the people. The American system of government was, at its
core, a limitation of government’s powers and a balancing of powers through
various systems of checks and balances to protect the people from the very
government they contracted to have.[6] Even democracy could be a tyranny of the
majority (as Plato and Aristotle had warned), and therefore a representational
government under a constitution and guided by laws was better.[7]
America was
established by those fleeing the oppressive rule of government, even over religious
beliefs. The heavy hand of government,
including over religious affairs, had been the order of the day in the 16th
century. Queen Mary I (‘Bloody Mary’)
well illustrates how this played out as she reversed
the recent introduction of Protestantism in England. During her brief reign from 1553-1558, she
aggressively sought to use her power to reinstitute Catholicism. According to the royal website, ‘Mary restored papal supremacy in
England, abandoned the title of Supreme Head of the Church, reintroduced Roman
Catholic bishops and began the slow reintroduction of monastic orders.’[8] She also persecuted Protestants standing in
her way of Catholisizing England. Thomas
Cranmer, Nicholas Ridley, and Hugh Latimer of the Anglican Church were burned
at the stake in 1555, and a further 3,000 Protestants were killed. Bloody Mary also opposed free speech by
restoring laws against heresy.
In the next century, Oliver Cromwell led the
Civil War against the monarchy, and King Charles I, a Catholic, was executed in
1649. Cromwell was a religious Independent, advocating local, congregational
governance of church matters rather than wider ecclesiastical or political
control. The revolution was
unsuccessful, however, and in 1660, the monarchy was restored with King Charles
II. The power of the monarch over
England’s colonies came to a head 100 years later, with King George III on the
throne.
In light of such a history, the American
colonies took up arms against the crown of England. Affirming divine sovereignty over government
rather than the divine authority of government, natural law and inalienable
rights, the idea that government is formed as a social contract, and that
government exists for the governed, the founding fathers declared independence
from England and her king. The American
Declaration of Independence based the decision to oppose British rule on four
premises:
·
‘All men are created equal’;
·
‘they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights’
(Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness);
·
‘governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from
the consent of the governed’;
·
‘whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is
the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government,
laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such
form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness.’[9]
These four premises, note, limit government’s role rather than
expand it. Government plays the role of
protection. The first premise limits the
power of some group or class of persons to rule others (such as the British
ruling the American colonies without their representation). The second premise insists that government is
to have no authority over natural rights given to citizens by their Creator,
not the people or the government. The
third premise limits government by requiring consent from those governed. The fourth premise argues that governments
can and should be altered or even replaced when they use their form (or
mechanisms) and power for destructive purposes.
Particularly in mind are purposes that fail to protect the safety and
happiness of its citizens.
In each of these four premises, one can see
that the view of government endorsed is that government exists to protect the
freedoms of people—individuals—in society.
It does not exist to advance an ideology or social programme that
requires the conformity of its citizens.
Indeed, expansive, socialistic forms of government proposed in the 19th
century (and today) were fundamentally a departure from America’s founding
principles of government—and opposition to monarchical authority in the Old
Testament, for that matter.
The Constitution of the United States follows
this statement of the role of government in the Declaration of Independence
with a further understanding:
We the People of
the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice,
insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defence, promote the general
Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do
ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America.
Cicero would have approved. While this preamble states that the first
goal is to ‘form a more perfect Union,’ this is not meant in the sense of the
government’s making people support good values but in the sense of limiting the
role of government to certain values.
These values are: justice, domestic tranquility (peace), common defense,
general welfare (‘pursuit of happiness’), and the blessings of liberty. The alternative between a limited government
and an expansive government was highlighted in the American and the French
Revolutions, respectively, as we shall further see.
Paul does not
provide a perspective on types of government, as we see in discussion in Greek
and Roman philosophers of his time. He
does, however, pray for a governmental authority that protects the rights of
life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness—so to speak—for Christianity to
flourish. He says, ‘I urge that supplications, prayers,
intercessions, and thanksgivings be made for all people, 2 for
kings and all who are in high positions, that we may lead a peaceful and quiet
life, godly and dignified in every way’ (1 Timothy 2.1-2; ESV and throughout). This suggests a distinction of the Church
from the government, with the latter leaving the Church to its own way of
life. As the passage continues, the
freedom of the Church to evangelize is of particular importance (2.3-7). The peaceful life is not a private religious
existence for the Church but the freedom to be a missional community, with
protection from those in authority.
Second Proposal: The role of government is to create a
better society by making people support good values.
Those who see
government’s role enlarged rather than limited present their case in a positive
light. They say that they wish to create
a better society and that governmental powers should be used to make people
support good values. Such a view may be
popular in theory, but in reality those in power seem bent on a more
Machiavellian approach to governing. Niccolò
Machiavelli said in 1513/1514 that
a
man who wishes to act entirely up to his professions of virtue soon meets with
what destroys him among so much that is evil.
Hence it is necessary for a prince wishing to hold his own to know how
to do wrong, and to make use of it or not according to necessity (The Prince
15).[10]
One should not
rule with virtue in mind, Machiavelli averred, but with a realpolitik exercising power to maintain power. I propose to discuss some views to the
contrary in this section.
Aristotle
Aristotle argued that, although the bonds of the household precede
the existence of the state (as Cicero later argued), the bonds forming the
state are prior to it—as well as to the individual. He reasoned that, as parts of the body exist
for the whole body, so individuals exist for the state. Thus, an understanding of the individual
follows an understanding of the state in which he exists (Politics 1252a-1253a). He
wrote, ‘Man is by nature a political animal’ (1253a).[11]
Following his teacher, Plato (cf. Republic), Aristotle
understood politics in terms of six types of government, monarchy, aristocracy,
and constitutional governance, and their opposites, tyranny, oligarchy, and
democracy. What distinguishes the
positive forms from the negative forms in each case is that the first aim to
serve the community whereas the second are self-serving (Politics 3.1279b).[12] For our purposes, he further says that the
essential basis for the formation of a good state is the concern of citizens for
civic virtue and their opposition to vice.
He denies the sufficiency for social cohesion, for forming a government,
merely on the basis that a people share economic, commercial, or military
interests, or even because they desire law and order or wish to live by some
social contract (constitutional government) (Politics 3.1280a-b). Rather,
the state must have a moral foundation.
It is, therefore, a moral force.
Aristotle wrote, ‘it is also clear
that any state that is truly so called and is not a state merely in name must
pay attention to virtue; for otherwise the community becomes merely an
alliance’ (Politics 3.1280b). Reducing the state to a merely legal entity,
guaranteeing people’s just claims against one another, will not address the
deeper cohesiveness of a society formed with virtuous intents. The goal of the state is for all to live the
good life, and, for this to work, society must go beyond contractual relations;
it must exist in friendships between family and clans, cemented through
marriages between them. Familial bonds
and friendships will lead to noble actions (Politics
3.1281a). In Nichomachean Ethics,
Aristotle says, ‘…the Supreme Good was the end [goal] of political science,
but the principal care of this science is to produce a certain character in
the citizens, namely to make them virtuous, and capable of performing noble
action’ (I.IX.8).[13]
This line of argument can take a socialist turn over private
interests, as it did for both Plato and Aristotle. For example, in regard to social versus
private education, Aristotle prefers the Spartan model:
And inasmuch as the end for the whole state is one, it is manifest
that education also must necessarily be one and the same for all and that the
superintendence of this must be public, and not on private lines, in the way in
which at present each man superintends the education of his own children, teaching
them privately, and whatever special branch of knowledge he thinks fit. But
matters of public interest ought to be under public supervision; at the same
time we ought not to think that any of the citizens belongs to himself, but
that all belong to the state, for each is a part of the state, and it is
natural for the superintendence of the several parts to have regard to the
superintendence of the whole. And one might praise the Spartans in respect of
this, for they pay the greatest attention to the training of their children,
and conduct it on a public system (Politics
8.1337a).
Here is the
ancient version of the view that the state owns the children and oversees what
they are taught. Therefore, education
must be public and not private.
Aristotle was not advocating a ‘nanny state’ form of socialism, where
the state serves the citizens and supplies them with their wants. The Spartans are rather the model: citizens
serve the state. Aristotle would have
agreed with Germany today in opposing homeschooling.
With the winds
of 19th century Positivism at his back and just prior to the First
World War, in 1912, an American Baptist pastor, Walter Rauschenbusch, laid out
his vision for the Social Gospel:
An unchristian social
order can be known by the fact that it makes good men do bad things. It tempts, defeats, drains, and degrades, and
leaves men stunted, cowed, and shamed in their manhood. A Christian social order makes bad men do
good things. It sets high aims, steadies
the vagrant impulses of the weak, trains the power of the young, and is felt by
all as an uplifting force which leaves them with the consciousness of a broader
and nobler humanity as their years go on….[14]
The more that Western nations
reject Christian values, Rauschenbusch’s view of the authority of a social
order—a government—enforcing good values fades.
Yet, beyond this, is it ever the role of a government to be a moral
force in society? Christendom in Europe
long debated the roles of the Church and the state. The Old Testament, too, presents this debate
in preferring Godly judges to kings and sending prophets to challenge wayward
kings.
Peter argued
that Christians should be ‘subject for the Lord’s sake to every human
institution’ (1 Peter 2.13). He says that the emperor and governors are sent by
God ‘to punish those who do evil and to praise those who do good’
(2.13-14). Yet Christians should live as
people who are free (from external authorities) because they are slaves of God
(2.16). Peter applies this next to the
master-slave relationship and particularly to Christian slaves serving
non-Christian, abusive masters. Even in
such a case, Christians are to be subject and show respect (2.18). The reason for this may have been that
expressed in the case of Christian wives and their unbelieving husbands: by
their good conduct, they may win their husbands to the ‘word’ (the Gospel)
(3.1; cf. 1 Corinthians 7.16). Gospel
witness, not some endorsement of or opposition to abusive authority, is the
goal.
The early
Christians knew that governments had been and could be an evil authority and
miscarry justice, as noted in 2 Thessalonians 2.3-9 and Revelation. Revelation
presents Roman political and economic power as wicked and oppressive (cf. chs.
13 and 18 in particular). The early
Christians knew that John the Baptist had been beheaded by Herod Antipas and
Jesus by Pontius Pilate, and they also shared the Jewish suspicion of
governmental power. The story of the Old
Testament included the utter failure of the monarchies of the northern and
southern kingdom and the need for God’s rule.
The precariousness of God’s people at the hands of governmental
authority was told in the books of Daniel and Esther. The story of Antiochus IV Epiphanes’ attempt
to enforce godly Jews to conform to Hellenistic religion and culture in the 2nd
c. BC was remembered in the Feast of Lights each year. In the 60s, both Paul and Peter would be
killed in the time of Nero. The book of
Revelation may have been written during the persecution of Christians by
Domitian. The most Christians could say
was that, where justice existed and was enforced in law and order, government
played a role in God’s purposes (so Romans 13.1-7), but no government held
divine right to rule apart from divine justice.
The Church existed, like the Old Testament prophets, to remind the state
that it was not the Kingdom of God and was subject to God’s justice.
The French Revolution
The French Revolution offered some similar yet
different values to the American Revolution.
One popular proposal promoted the values of liberty, equality, and
fraternity. Yet one might ask, as some
did, whether liberty secured equality or equality secured liberty. If the former, then people would be given
equal opportunity. If the latter, then
government would play a greater role in assuring equal outcomes—now termed
‘equity’. François-Noël Babeuf (1760-1797) argued that
equality should be understood as equal results rather than equal
opportunity. Babeuf advocated reform of
the agrarian tax system by abolishing feudal dues, a redistribution of the
land, and an equal income for all. His
revolutionary beliefs included the view that a government might be overthrown
and a new one formed by an elite minority.
If so, again, government must play a greater, controlling role. Indeed, the value of fraternity highlights
the French commitment to a social rather than individual understanding. The differences between the American and
French understanding of government have played out historically, although
within America there is also an ongoing debate about the limited (protection of
individual rights and values) versus the expanded (enforcement of social rights
and values) view of government.
Progressives have supported a French revolutionary understanding,
advocating equal outcomes enforced by a socialist, sometimes even Marxist,
state.
The early Church
practiced voluntary communalism in Jerusalem, as we read in the early chapters
of the book of Acts. This was not
practiced elsewhere, but almsgiving was already an established religious
practice in Judaism that continued in the Church, and giving to the poor was
definitive for Christian community (cf. Galatians 2.10; 6.10; 2 Corinthians
8-9). The temple tax was not required
(cf. Matthew 17.24-27), and tithing in ancient Israel was associated with the
Levites and the Temple, not the palace.
In other words, voluntary contributions and community practices rather
than government enforcement of ethics created a distinction between the roles
of religion and government, of the Church and the state. The French approach to government oppressed
and replaced the Church as a moral entity, controlling people’s lives. A socialist might limit government’s role
more than what one finds in the French Revolution, but socialism in general
transfers the voluntary and religious role of the Church to state control.
Marxism
Karl Marx and
Friedrich Engels wrote The Communist
Manifesto in 1847 to outline the views of communism. The document begins by arguing that history
is the story of an age-old clash between classes—the oppressors and
oppressed—and has become focused in the modern age of capitalism on the clash
between the bourgeoisie (the owners of the means of production and employers of
wage earners) and the proletariat (those without the means of production who
must sell their labor). The bourgeoisie
replaced the feudal lords, patriarchs, and idealist groups of the past
(religious, chivalrous, ‘philistine sentimentalism’). They wielded superiority over others with
‘the icy water of egotistical calculation’ (i.e., capitalist greed). The enemy of the communist system, then, is
Free Trade—‘veiled by religious and political illusions, it has substituted
naked, shameless, direct, brutal exploitation.’[15] Class now revolves around money, and one
significant result of this is a globalization not only of markets but of
civilisation, making ‘barbarian nations’ dependent on the civilized ones. Another result was urban growth and the
cities’ domination of the countryside.
Socialist
governance requires an expansion and centralization of political
authority. Communism’s economic and
class conflict analysis of history and politics creates a moral mandate for
government to aid the proletariat against the capitalist bourgeoisie. This also removes the moral role from the
Church (or other institutions) and transfers it to the government, even more
than is typically the case in other forms of socialism. This is even true for the most basic
component of society, the family. As in
Sparta, children belong to the state and are to be educated by them.
Islam
While communism represents an atheistic
form of government enforcing morality, Islam as a political religion does as
well. Writing
in the context of issues facing India and Pakistan in the 1930s, Abdul A’la Maududi opposed nationalism as inconsistent with
Islam. Islam makes no distinction
between the state and religion, and it is transnational in a religious rather
than economic (as in communism) way.
Maududi established an Islamic state within the political state of India
around 1940 called Jamaat-e-Islami. Shortly
thereafter, in 1947, Pakistan became an Islamic state, independent from India. His writings have continued to be important
for Islamic states. In a paper first delivered
in 1971, "The Theory of Political Islam", he commends ‘theo-democracy’.[16] Any Muslim in any place is a part of the
Islamic State that transcends geographical or national borders. Early in his career, he wrote that
Islam requires
the earth - not just a portion, but the entire planet - not because the
sovereignty over the earth should be wrested from one nation or group of
nations and vested in any one particular nation, but because the whole of
mankind should benefit from Islam, and its ideology and welfare programme.
It is to serve
this end that Islam seeks to press into service all the forces which can bring
about such a revolution. The term which covers the use of all these forces is
‘Jihad’. To alter people’s outlook and spark a mental and intellectual
revolution through the medium of speech and the written word is a form of
Jihad. To change the old tyrannical system and establish a just new order by
the power of the sword is also Jihad, as is spending wealth and undergoing
physical exertion for this cause.[17]
An International
Revolutionary Party (cf. the communist state’s politburo) is needed to destroy
any non-Muslim system and replace it with the Word of Allah. By it, Islamic functionaries will work to
remove ‘oppression, wrongdoing, strife, immorality, arrogance and unlawful
exploitation from the world by force of arms.’[18] Maududi argues that Islam seeks to establish virtue and
prohibit evil, not only individually but also socially, to establish world
peace.[19] Thus, an Islamic understanding of ethics and
religion has the power of the state behind it and is international. The options for non-Muslims in a Muslim state
are to convert, pay a tax (if they are ‘people of the book’—Jews and
Christians—but not if they are something else), or be killed.
While Christendom in European
history also took such an approach to using the state’s power to enforce moral
values, this has no justification in the New Testament. The way of the cross and the understanding
that moral change comes from God’s work within, not external control, provides
a very different approach to morality and power.
Third Proposal: The role of government is to remove
people in society who support bad values.
The previous
vision and this vision for government’s role are extensive and forceful. Possibilities within them are also
wide-ranging. The difference is that the
former vision is positively construed (whatever its practical outworking),
whereas this vision is negative. Here,
government wields the rod, not the carrot.
Plato
In his Republic, Plato offered a blueprint for the good state. In Laws,
he explained in greater detail what virtues and laws should be affirmed for the
healthy state. In the latter work, Plato
argued for the need to purify society.
By this, Plato means punishment by execution or exile of those who are
corrupt because of their nature or nurture.
The governors of a state are responsible for separating the healthy from
the unhealthy. This separation also
involves an immigration policy that welcomes good people with open arms but
excludes the bad if they fail certain tests of character and do not change
after attempts to persuade them.
After a
discussion of land redistribution and debt forgiveness, he turned to the
subject of religion. The state should
not make changes to established religion but support whatever is necessary for
its continuance. This would involve not
accepting changes to religions called for by persons claiming to have
apparitions or heavenly inspiration to do so.
It would involve allowing images, altars, and temples, and accepting the
sacred domains for each. It further
entails allowing people to meet for religious celebrations, since religion
contributes to social cohesion. Through
religious association, citizens develop relationships and come to know each
other. Religion was good for society.
In Plato’s view,
the socialist state was to play a strong role in establishing whatever it
considered to be a healthy society. His
description of this is eerily reminiscent of nationalist socialism of Nazi
Germany, yet the details of what is meant by a pure society lead in different
directions. (The latter’s grounding on
eugenic theory was a critical component to fascist nationalism.)[20] Interestingly, Plato’s view of a healthy
society did not involve a separation of the state and religion that led to
privatization of religion, as in our day, but to the state’s promotion of
diverse religions in a polytheist society—at least, to what it regarded as
acceptable religions. (The Areopagus
oversaw religious matters in Athens at the time.)
Augustine
The Church’s
position in society throughout the first three centuries often involved
persecution of one sort or another.
Christianity did not enjoy the same position among other religions. Romans respected religions for their
antiquity and association with a particular people (e.g., Judaism). It was regarded more as a kind of atheism
alongside Epicurean philosophy or as a superstition. In the beginning of the 4th
century, however, the Emperor Constantine converted to Christianity and gave
state support to the once persecuted faith.
This altered the relationship between the Church and the State, leading
to the long history of Christian expansion in Europe with state support: what
we know as Christendom.
The Donatist
Controversy in the 4th – 5th centuries concerned the
purity of the Church’s clergy. The
origins of this matter began when some North African clergy during the
persecution of Christians by Emperor Diocletian (284-305) handed over their
Scriptures as a token renunciation of the faith. The Donatists—followers of bishop Donatus
Magnus, argued that the clergy who did this (‘traditores’) could not administers the sacraments. While Donatist rigorists held that nobody was
eligible for the clergy who had committed apostasy, the majority of the Church
held that even repentant apostates could be readmitted after a long process of
penance. In St. Augustine’s (354-430)
day, Donatists rioted and resorted to violence in support of their cause. In response, the government stepped in with
force, adding further questions about the Church’s attitude toward government
authority in ecclesiastical matters and the use of force in defense of what one
group or another considered to be a worthy, religious cause.
Augustine argued
in favor of the use of force to put down the Donatists. Vincentius, bishop of Cartenna in the Roman
province of Mauretania Caesariensis (now in northern Morocco), held that nobody
should be compelled to be righteous (as we learn from Augustine in his Letter 93.5). Writing to his fellow bishop in 408,
Augustine rejected this position, stating:
if we were
so to overlook and forbear with those cruel enemies who seriously disturb our
peace and quietness by manifold and grievous forms of violence and
treachery, as that nothing at all should be contrived and done by us with a
view to alarm and correct them, truly we would be
rendering evil for evil. For if any one saw his enemy running
headlong to destroy himself when he had become delirious through a dangerous
fever, would he not in that case be much
more truly rendering evil for evil if he
permitted him to run on thus, than if he took measures to have him seized and
bound? (Letter 93.2).
(The matter
faces Christians attacked and killed by Muslims today, as in northern
Nigeria.) Augustine defended his
position by appeal to Scripture. From Jeremiah,[21]
we learn that God punished even when her continued rebellion was a surety (Letter 93.3). Persuasion not only by instruction but also
by fear was necessary in the just cause of salvation, he averred. Moreover, since some may have wanted to
abandon their error yet feared to do so because of persecution, meeting such
fear with the fear of force from good men would give them reason to do so.
Augustine also
appeals to Proverbs 27.6: ‘Faithful are the wounds of a friend; profuse are the
kisses of an enemy’ (Letter 93.4). He notes that love is the motivation behind
the infliction of such wounds. In the
parable of the banquet, the servants are instructed to ‘compel’ guests to come
in (Luke 14.23).[22] He further notes Jesus’ words, ‘No one can
come to me unless the Father who sent me draws him’ (John 6.44) (Letter 93.5). Augustine allegorically interprets Genesis
16.5, Sarah’s restraint of Hagar, as a lesson on the spirit inflicting hardship
on the carnal (cf. Galatians 4.29), motivated by love. The literal use of force is found in
suffering inflicted on the Egyptians when they wished to maintain power over
the Israelites (Exodus 5.4-9), Elijah’s killing Jezebel’s false prophets in
response to her killing God’s prophets (1 Kings 18.4, 40) (Letter 93.6). Augustine
defended his position from the New Testament as well. First Corinthians 5.5 and 1 Timothy 1.20 (he
mentions other passages), make the point that punishment can and should be
motivated out of a desire for correction (Letter
93.7).
The use of
violence is bad when done for injury but good when done with good
intentions—for correction and in defense of the truth (Letter 93.8). Augustine
illustrates this from the story of the Babylonian king, Nebuchadnezzar, who did
evil when he threw Daniel’s friends into the fiery furnace for not bowing to
his idol but did good when he later decreed that anyone speaking against their
God would be punished (Daniel 3.1-7, 29).
Applying this lesson to his day, Augustine argued that, now that the
Emperors are converted Christians, they should apply force in the cause of
right belief (Letter 93.9, 19). The application of force aids people to take
their stand one way or the other (Letter 93.16). Clemency, however, should be shown, and the
motivation for inflicting punishment should be restoration (Letter 93.10). Augustine says, in fact,
that his own view changed when he witnessed how his town rejected Donatism once
fear of imperial edicts threatened them (Letter
93.17). Augustine maintained that
Paul affirmed this in Romans 13.1b-3
For there is no authority except from God, and those
that exist have been instituted by God. 2 Therefore whoever resists the authorities resists what God
has appointed, and those who resist will incur judgment. 3 For rulers are not a terror to
good conduct, but to bad. Would you have no fear of the one who is in
authority? Then do what is good, and you will receive his approval….
Augustine would
have rigorously opposed universalist theology affirming other religions[23]
or settling on arguments for coexistence with other religions. God’s purpose is to make His name great among
the heathen (Malachi 1.11) and extend His rule universally (Psalm 72.17-19) (Letter 93.20). Thus, the mission of the Church is to expand
throughout the whole earth (Luke 24.44-47; Acts 1.8; Psalm 19.4; Matthew 24.14;
Letter 93.21-22).
Gratian
Several hundred
years later, a twelfth century scholar by the name of Gratian compiled a
collection of existing laws known as the Decretum. It included a discussion of the problem of
heretical bishops and others oppressing the apostolic, catholic Church. This led the latter to summon for help from
the emperor and his army. The Church’s
earlier response to the Donatist controversy is then offered as a precedent,
and the conclusion in Gratian is that God Himself beseeches, threatens,
rebukes, and uses temporal powers (C. II). The intervention of the state meant
that some people were killed, some lost their property, and some were
imprisoned in order to restore the unity of the Church by means of compulsion
(C. 23).
One of the
questions that this raised was, ‘Are the bad to be forced to do good?’ (C. 23
quest. 6). The answer to this question
acknowledged the value of peace among different orthodox groups but not of
peaceful coexistence or unity with the unorthodox heretics. Peace required the restraint of evil and the
relief from oppression of the good. To
this end, the government could use force with the Church’s approval, but it was
inappropriate when used for greed or out of cruelty (C. VI). In support of this view, the Church argued
that St. Paul was compelled by Christ to stop his persecution of the Church and
then instructed in the faith: he was first struck, then consoled (C. I).
A Final Word: Being the Church in the World
Such arguments
find no development from the Old to the New Testament, from Israel to the
Church. A religious state is radically
different from an international people of God.
A righteous king’s rule in Israel is not the same as a crucified
Messiah. Ezra required Israelites to cut
off idolatrous influence by divorcing foreign wives (10.11), whereas Paul
encouraged Christians to remain in such marriages if possible so that the
unbelieving spouse might come to faith (1 Corinthians 7.10-16). The relationship to culture changes when the
purpose is not only purity but also witness and invitation to conversion. Jesus prayed, ‘I do not ask that you take them out of the world, but
that you keep them from the evil one (John 17.15).
Three forms of
government appear in the Old Testament: a familial, clan structure by nomadic
pastoralists, a religio-militarily government by tribal judges (from Moses to
Samuel), and a monarchical, often tyrannical government patterned after other
Ancient Near Eastern nations. No
particular form of government receives singular support in the Old Testament as
only obedience to God counts. The
prophets played the role of calling the people, including the kings, to
obedience to God. This prophetic role,
standing outside the government structure, concludes with John the
Baptist. Jesus brought God’s Kingdom,
distinct from any government (whether Herodian or Roman) and critical of the
existing religious authorities (Sadducees, chief priests, Pharisees, scribes)
and the elders. The Church as God’s holy
people had the role of creating a better society by offering God’s salvation to
those who received Christ as Lord and teaching God’s Kingdom righteousness.
A close alliance
of Church and state does not reflect the New Testament’s
perspective. While the Church might
approve of the State’s exercise of justice, it does not enter into an alliance
with the state to defend or advance orthodoxy.
About to be crucified, Jesus told Pilate, ‘My kingdom is not of this
world’ (John 18.36). The distinction
between Church and state is also seen in Paul’s writings. While the Old Testament Law gave civil
authorities the right to put someone to death, this did not apply to the
Church. For example, the Law called for
the death penalty for someone sexually involved with his father’s wife
(Leviticus 20.11; cf. 18.8). Paul uses
this law to condemn such a man in the Corinthian church, but the punishment was
excommunication, not execution (1 Corinthians 5.1-5). The local church has authority to enforce
morality on its own congregants and not with the force that the government
could exercise. Nor could it enforce its
morality on those outside the Church (1 Corinthians 5.9-13). Removing evil from the midst of the Church by
excommunication was important (1 Corinthians 5.6-8), but the state alone had
the power of the sword (Romans 13.4), not the Church. The state should punish criminality but not
heresy; it might punish persecution or murder of Christians for injustice, but
not for opposition to faith.
Paul appreciated the role of government to involve the
negative role of administering justice to criminals (Romans 13.1-7), but this
instead of Christians using violence:
Repay no one evil for evil, but give thought to do
what is honorable in the sight of all. 18 If possible, so far as it depends on you, live peaceably
with all. 19 Beloved,
never avenge yourselves, but leave it to the wrath of God,
for it is written, “Vengeance is mine, I will repay, says the Lord.” 20 To the contrary, “if your enemy
is hungry, feed him; if he is thirsty, give him something to drink; for by so
doing you will heap burning coals on his head.” 21 Do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good.
While government is not thought of as a moral authority that ‘makes bad
people do good things’, it does punish those who do wrong. Paul’s view is in
line with what Cicero says about government, including the notion that its
administration of justice is a God-given trust:
It is, then,
peculiarly the place of a magistrate to bear in mind that he represents the
state and that it is his duty to uphold its honour and its dignity, to enforce
the law, to dispense to all their constitutional rights, and to remember that
all this has been committed to him as a sacred trust (De Officiis 1.124).[24]
For Paul, God
gives us an outward and an inward authority that judges our conduct. He gives us a government official who 'is
God's servant for your good' (13.3), and He gives us a conscience to condemn
our misdeeds for our own good (cf. 13.5).
Natural laws written on human hearts are witnessed to by our consciences
(Romans 2.15; cf. 9.1; 2 Corinthians 1.12).
Governments, of course, may be unjust, and consciences may be weak (1
Corinthians 8.10, 12) or seared (1 Timothy 4.2): this is no absolute
endorsement of any government’s actions but only of the concept of a rule of
justice by which governments and consciences should be guided. His view for government is judicial: it
punishes evildoers. Yet he does not
understand government positively as an authority that shapes people
morally. Indeed, this was the role of
the Church. Government is approved by
God to be an avenger that carries out God’s wrath on the wrongdoer (Romans
13.4). Peter also expected government to
punish evildoers, and it could also commend those doing good (1 Peter 2.14).
The Church
favors a limited government in which it is free to evangelize and live in
obedience to God. It offers an
alternative way of life to all, including the government, while acknowledging
its role to exercise justice. As Paul
says, ‘Our citizenship is in heaven, and from it we await a Savior, the Lord
Jesus Christ’ (Philippians 3.20). Peter
calls believers ‘exiles’ in the world living as God’s slaves (1 Peter 1.1;
2.11, 16). They represent God’s will,
His good, to the world (2.15). They are
‘a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for his own
possession, that you may proclaim the excellencies of him who called you out of
darkness into his marvelous light’ (2.9).
The Church
recognizes that those outside the Church have bad values, and it calls them to
repent and turn to God. As Paul says,
They are darkened in their understanding, alienated
from the life of God because of the ignorance that is in them, due to their
hardness of heart. 19 They have become callous and have given
themselves up to sensuality, greedy to practice every kind of impurity (Ephesians 4.18-19).
He says, ‘the god of this world has blinded the minds of the
unbelievers, to keep them from seeing the light of the gospel of the glory of
Christ’ (2 Corinthians 4.4). God has
given ‘the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus’ to
believers, and it is the Church’s role to shine that light in the darkness of
the world (4.5-6).
Thus, about the last thing
expected of government is that it would have the role of creating a better
society by forcing people to have good values.
People need to hear the Gospel and convert and thereby be transformed by
the power of the Gospel. Western nations
have increasingly attempted to sideline the Church, make religion private, mask
believers, and even criminalise its teachings.
Islamic nations and groups have persecuted and killed Christians, as in
Nigeria and Pakistan. China is forcefully ‘sinicizing’ the Church—turning it
into a cultural fancy and platform for state propaganda.[25] Christians in various regions of India have
been persecuted by Hindus. In all this,
the Church’s response must be to ‘speak boldly’ the Gospel of Jesus Christ
(Acts 9.27-28; 13.46; 14.3; 18.26; 19.8; 26.26; Ephesians 6.18-20). The Church is not dependent upon the state or
a support for the state. To quote Stanley
Hauerwas, ‘The primary social task of the church is to be itself: a people with
a story which provides the skills for the negotiation of the dangers of this
existence, trusting in God’s promise of redemption.’[26]
[2] Cf. Rollin G. Grams, ‘Reconstructing Public Theology with Old
Testament Foundations,’ Journal of
Religion and Public Life, Vol. 1.1 (April, 2024), pp. 4-29.
[3] M. Tullius Cicero. De Officiis,
trans. Walter Miller (Cambridge. Harvard University Press; Cambridge, Mass.,
London, England. 1913).
[4] E.g., Jose P. Miranda, Marx
and the Bible: A Critique of the Philosophy of Oppression (Eugene, OR: Wipf
and Stock, 2004).
[5] Hobbes, Leviathan,
rev. student edition, ed. Richard Tuck (Cambridge Texts in the History of
Political Thought; Cambridge: Cambridge Univ., 1991).
[6] James Madison’s writing in the 47th Federalist Paper makes the argument for the separation of powers,
basing this on Montesque’s The Spirit of
Law (1748).
[7] One of America’s founding
fathers, James Madison, addressed the matter of the tyranny of the majority in
the 10th Federalist Paper. He argued that, to mitigate this problem, a representational
government rather than a straight democracy was preferable. (Hence two senators from each state and the
electoral system, e.g.).
[8] ‘Mary I (r. 1553-1558),’ online: https://www.royal.uk/mary-i (accessed 7
April, 2024).
[9] ‘Declaration of Independence’, online: Declaration
of Independence: A Transcription | National Archives (accessed 7 December,
2024).
[10] Nicolò Machiavelli, The Prince, trans. W. K. Marriott (The
Project Gutenberg, 2006); online at https://www.gutenberg.org/files/1232/1232-h/1232-h.htm#link2HCH0015 (accessed 8 June,
2020).
[11] His further argument is that humans are gifted with speech and are
therefore social animals. Also, humans
know good from bad and right from wrong, as well as other moral matters. The bond that they form around moral matters
is the basis of the household and the state (Politics 1253a). Quotations
from Politics are from Aristotle,
Aristotle in 23 Volumes, Vol. 21,
trans. H. Rackham (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1944).
[12] Democracy was understood as direct rule by voting, as opposed to
constitutional government. Note that the
alternatives are those King Rehoboam faced (1 Samuel 8).
[13] Aristotle. Aristotle in 23
Volumes, Vol. 19, trans. H. Rackham (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University
Press, 1934).
[14] Walter
Rauschenbusch, Christianizing the Social
Order (NY: Macmillan Co., 1926), p. 127.
[15] The translation is found at https://www.marxists.org/admin/books/manifesto/Manifesto.pdf
(accessed 8 April, 2024).
[16] Sayyid Abul A'la Maududi, “Political Theory of Islam,” in
Khurshid Ahmad, ed., Islam: Its Meaning and Message (Leicester: The Islamic Foundation,
1999).
[17] Sayyid Abul Ala Maududi, Al Jihad fil Islam, trans. Khurshid Ahmad, ed. Huda
Khattab (1930): online: Jihad
in Islam.pdf (accessed 7 December, 2024), n.p.
[18] Ibid.
[19] Sayyid Abul Ala Maududi, Al
Jihad Fil Islam [Jihad in Islam], trans. Syed Rafatullah Shah (Lahore:
Irfan Afzal Printing Press, 1927), n.p.; online: Maududi,
Sayyid Abul A'la Al Jihad Fil Islam By Syed Abul Aala Maududi : Free Download,
Borrow, and Streaming : Internet Archive (accessed 7 December, 2024), cf.
pp. 70-72.
[20] For my discussion of this, see ‘What is Fascism--and Do We Need to Worry about This in the American
Presidential Election?,’ Bible and
Mission Blog (29 October, 2024); online: Bible and Mission: What is Fascism--and Do We Need to
Worry about This in the American Presidential Election?.
[21] ‘In vain have I struck your children; they took no
correction’ (Jeremiah 2.30a, ESV).
[22] The Greek word, anagkazō, means ‘compel, use force,
constrain’, and the Latin is ‘compelle
intrare’.
[23] The current pope has affirmed universalism. See my ‘'Is the Pope Catholic?' A Response to
the Universalism of Pope Francis,’ Bible
and Mission Blog (15 September, 2024); online: Bible and Mission: 'Is the Pope
Catholic?' A Response to the Universalism of Pope Francis.
[24] M. Tullius Cicero, De
Officiis, trans. Walter Miller (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press,
1913).
[25] Cf. Rollin G. Grams, ‘Sinicization: State-Enforced Enculturation of
the Gospel and Church,’ Bible and Mission
Blog (10 August, 2023); online: Bible and Mission: Sinicization:
State-Enforced Enculturation of the Gospel and Church.
[26] Stanley Hauerwas, A Community of Character: Toward a
Constructive Christian Social Ethic (Notre Dame: University of Notre Dame
Press, 1981), p. 10.
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