When 'Love Your Enemies' Gets You Killed: A Historical Reality Check!
The Brutal Truth About Turning the Other Cheek
4 min read
Jesus warned, ‘He who lives by the sword, dies by the sword.’ We all know the phrase, along with the promoting peace, expressions like ‘turn the other cheek.’ Ironically, it was his apostles who were allegedly non-violent, they met violent deaths. Here's the brutal truth; it is the decision to do no violence that led to violent endings. Various historical examples of pacifism shows persecution.
How Is The Alternative to Peace Often The Most Peaceful Solution?
Those scripture-based beliefs and philosophies were not common among the Germanic Pagan tribes. In contrast, to non-violent ideologies such tribes valued loyalty to their warlord, honoured bravery in combat, and vengeance, for example. Piety to them was martial discipline and defending their people. They embraced war and readiness to fight became a deterrent. These people also enjoyed what money could bring instead of denying it. They invested in fortification after defeating their Roman oppressors and grew as a nation.
The Alternative to Aggression Does Not Always Bring Peace
Christian forgiveness painted a target on their backs. Why? Romans saw Christian defiance as dangerous rebellion. Not only were Christians seen as weak by Rome for forgiving those who beat them, but also considered to be noncompliant sophists (possibly like insincere apologists of today). To Romans, this behavior was unnaturally weak. In Acts, Stephen prayed for those who stoned him. This stuff isn't all religious; non-Christian pacifists were murdered, like the Greek Stoics and Pythagoreans.
Changing Perspectives From Vikings To Christian Crusaders
Why did pacifists make such tempting targets? However, on a practical level it is right to say that viking families did benefit from plundering gold enriched monasteries. Buildings of plunder guarded by peaceful, unarmed monks who preached against wealth - you can't write this stuff. It's likely the Scandinavian pagans saw the new faith as the enemy, tension divided the cultural mindsets! Later, the dynamics did a full 360 spin with Catholic Crusaders slaughtering thousands of Christian Cathars for heresy - how does that even follow? The Cathars refused to fight back. 'Kill them all; God will know his own,' yelled a leading crusader.
Quite an Alien Way of Seeing Things.
From the outside, pacifism looks like voluntary martyrdom. Let's be real, if making a sacrificial point wouldn't work against an over the top global threat like an alien fleet, why use it against aggressive human oppressors?
In the end, didn't Christian warriors expose pacifism as not doable? Take Joan of Arc for example, or even Saint Derfel, are examples of Christians who killed in war, literally as contradictory as waterproof teabags or rainbow coloured camouflage. Is this just like sharing the Buddha's wisdom with football hooligans or rioters?
A Harsh Point
Yes, living by the sword could result with death, but peaceful submission didn’t spare many either! The Gospels all simply imply we shouldn't kill each other, but that doesn't always work. How can we love our enemies if it is so unhealthy to do so? Okay, maybe if enemy love meant something else altogether: possibly expressing good will despite the challenges an enemy brings? I don't know. It's not clear.
A.) To be fair, why would the enemies of early Christians want to listen to preachers? People hold their own perspectives, language barriers, like with the Kali worshippers who brutally speared St. Thomas to death in India did.
B.) So many people credit Jesus Christ with the whole non-violence thing. However, it's written in all kinds of ancient sources. Greek philosophers like Epictetus, Pythagorus and Socrates, as well as the previously mentioned Jewish groups, but also Romans like Cicero and Seneca all value peace and non violence.
I Guess That's It! My Conclusion...
Maybe very few of us appreciate pacifism when things kick off? Sometime in the past, we reverted back to our ideals of justice and might. Just turn on the news and see US and UK borders and military posturing shows that our reliance on the sword has not faded (well, it's all machine gun now). But, if none of us had resisted the Hitlers and Napoleons of this world it would have succumbed to cruel monstrous leaders many times over! Compelling champions like Charles Martel, the Hammer of the Moors, the RAF during the battle of Britain or the Ukrainians in their fight for their country: they all make the use of force a valid case!
