Warren’s Daft Exegesis
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Rick Warren expands on the targeted assassination Gospel:
Am I advocating something dark, evil or something righteous?…Well, actually, the Bible says that evil cannot be negotiated with. It has to just be stopped…. In fact, that is the legitimate role of government. The Bible says that God puts government on earth to punish evildoers. Not good-doers. Evildoers.
I would like to say that this is an atypical example of misunderstanding the Apostle’s claims in Romans about obeying secular magistrates and recognizing their authority to punish evildoers, but I imagine that it is all too common. The statement in Romans presupposes that a secular magistrate has legitimate authority over those whom he punishes, which obviously does not apply to political leaders in other states. The entire discussion takes for granted that foreign political leaders are to be treated as criminals, and that they should be targeted for assassination because they are considered to be evil-doers under the authority of our government. There are several reasons why this is a dangerous claim, but more important it is an obviously false claim.
Filed under: Christianity, foreign policy, politics
That’s a good point about the fallacious interpretation Warren made. What I find more interesting, is how Warren is known as a new kind of church leader, a sane kind of church leader. I don’t think anybody was surprised when Falwell (or whoever) preached about the virtues of assassinating Chavez, but this feels out of character for Warren to be making belligerent statements. Or maybe I’ve read one too many NYT articles about the new evangelicalism. It’s possible that Warren has been like this all along and I’ve been projecting my ideals onto Warren of what a non-partisan, logical preacher would be like, when in fact, Warren is of the same cloth, as a Falwell, Robertson etc..
Also, “punish” evildoers doesn’t mean execute. And who gave Rick Warren the right to determine evil. Or, more importantly the President. If the government is going to undertake targeted assassinations they should certainly not pretend that there is a moral justification. Which leads me to ask, if I have understood you correctly, you advocate a pragmatic foreign policy with what you refer to as narrowly defined American interest. I got the impression, at least in the context of Wilsonian idealism, that you do not approve of moral concerns playing a role in foreign policy. So can your foreign policy permit targeted assassinations? In what circumstances?
Daniel is letting Rick Warren off easy. We know that the gospel writers regarded the Roman Empire as legitimate, which the numerous references to Ceasar and to those in authority (in both gospel and epistle make clear). So the Roman Empire – depending on when one believes the New Testament was written down – of Tiberius or Nero (assuming he is not the Beast – 666) or Caligula or whoever was somehow “legitimate” enough in their eyes. We’re not talking about the kindly Marcus Aurelius here.
So what sort of arrogance or parsing of the Scriptures would one use to say that a Chavez or Ahmedinajad is a real “evildoer” worthy of assassination. What is the gauge or benchmark? Chavez is obnoxious but he’s just a populist demagogue, and has Ahmedinajad done anything (as opposed to talking about doing things)? One could say that various American presidents, from Truman to today have caused through their policies the death of many more people (whatever their motives and intentions were) than your usual third world despot. And what about abortion? How many children (or fetuses) have been extinguished in the USA since Roe V. Wade? If “evil cannot be negotiated with,” then what would be the stance of Christians towards governments which have either allowed or encouraged this “evil?” “Daft exegesis” is too kind – looney and bizarre, and dumb, is more like it.
The Roman Empire wasn’t shy about invading countries and killing their leaders. I don’t think Warren’s inference is too big a stretch.
Of course, as Matt Duss’s commenter points out, one might also infer that the rulers of Iran are ‘ordained of God’ and not to be resisted.
I think it’s more important to note that Hannity is repeating a standard set of propaganda points about Ahmadinejad. The ‘wiped off the map’ line seems to be a mistranslation. In any case, Iran’s position is that the Israel/Palestine conflict should be resolved peacefully with a one-state solution, but Iran would support a two-state solution if the Palestinians agreed to it. The Iranians have never ‘threatened’ to impose their preferred solution.
Also, “punish†evildoers doesn’t mean execute.
It includes execution as a possibility, again regarding the practice of the Roman Empire.
It’s not clear what Hannity means by ‘take him out’. He might mean occupying Iran and deposing its government, with or without executions.
I doubt he really meant either. He just wanted to say something that sounded ‘tough’.
Of course, Ahmadinejad isn’t really the ‘dictator’ of Iran. I meant to include that in my list of ‘propaganda points’ in the last comment.
Unless if the Iranians perfected a new sort of revolutionary nuke that can differentiate one sort of Semite from another in Israel/Palestine, it seems that much of the threats are just hot air. Even if they somehow could destroy the Jewish parts of Israel without killing Palestinians, that would be quite a gift from Iran for their largely Muslim brethren. How can you have the “right of return” for Palestinians if their home is radioactive rubble for the next few hundred years?
I’ll admit that pastor Warren’s quote “God puts government on earth to punish evildoers” is worth a chuckle and also rings true for that fact that we all do evil and we are all punished by the very existence of government.
However I can’t help but think that its ridiculous to base one’s thinking and/or morality on the bible or any religion or religious text. I hope no one needs to interpret a 2000 year old book correctly in order to find their moral compass and to determine assassination is wrong.
I’m told that Saddleback Church has an evening service where everyone watches “24.” It fits.
The popularity and influence of a Christianity that degrades Jesus into a mascot for tradition/family/homeland tribalism is, I imagine, what has led to the creation of the Secular Right blog.
Rick Warren’s religious conservatism, not Daniel Larison’s, is well-represented in today’s GOP.
There’s no such thing as evil outside of comic books or other fiction writing. ‘Evil’ people actually think they are doing right. The correct term is insane. Hitler wasn’t evil, he was crazy.
‘ The ‘wiped off the map’ line seems to be a mistranslation.’
Not a mistranslation, a misrepresentation. The direct translation is ‘ the occupying regime must end’. There is no wording in Arabic that equates to ‘wipe off the map’. That comes from someone wanting to scare you by twisting words into myriad pretzel shapes. They’re lying about what he’s saying to make him more enemy-like. They’re building an Emanuel Goldstein for the base to rally against.
The direct translation is ‘ the occupying regime must end’.
Something a bit more poetic, like ‘vanish from the pages of time’.
There is no wording in Arabic that equates to ‘wipe off the map’.
I think you mean Farsi.
They’re lying about what he’s saying to make him more enemy-like.
That’s true in general, but I don’t think so in this particular case. It seems the error originated in an English translation published by the Iranians.
Abortionists have been assassinated. Were I on a jury I would have trouble not nullifying any penalty.
Is this good or evil? Before you decide too quickly, do not even the most apparently pacifistic pro-lifers really want to assassinate abortionists by proxy (i.e. they would condemn killing up to the point Roe v. Wade is overturned and people with badges are the ones who attack clinics and do violence to abortionists).
Government violence can only be good or evil as an organized and validated (through a judicial procedure) extension of what an ordinary person would do – good or evil. Evil cannot be made good by proxy (Having religious orders take guns and rob v.s. lobbying for taxation?). Nor is good altered by the actor – natural law determines the morality.
Government violence can only be good or evil as an organized and validated (through a judicial procedure) extension of what an ordinary person would do – good or evil.
According to one view of gov’t perhaps, but another view would hold that moral agency of a government is different from that of any particular individual, in so far as the government holds a certain authority with respect to the community that the individual does not.