THE BIBLE'S POLITICAL VISION

 

By Stephen Palmquist (stevepq@hkbu.edu.hk)

 

Politics and Religion

 

      If the Bible never explicitly endorses democracy, and continually warns against the dangers of trusting in the evil powers of this world, then how can so many Christians take it for granted that democracy and Christianity go together like hand and glove? In other words, what is it that often keeps Christians nowadays from seeing the deceptions of democracy unveiled in the previous chapter? Before we look to the Bible for an alternative to democracy, it will be helpful to discuss a fundamental objection which might be raised against the arguments developed in Chapter Two.

 

      Many Christians regard the God-man relationship as so distinct from man-man relationships that statements about the former (i.e., about divine government) could never be a reason for accepting or rejecting any worldly political system. To assume otherwise, it could be argued, would be to commit a fundamental "category mistake":[1] "politics and religion must be kept apart", one might insist, "because politics deals with our outward, human relationships, whereas religion deals with the relationship of our spirit to God." Adherents of this "two kingdoms" view would argue that the Bible offers no alternative political system, so it is prudent simply to choose the least evil of the worldly systems, which is democracy.

 

      This argument would be valid only if the Bible were to separate our spiritual and political natures into two unrelated realms, and if it were not to offer a specific political philosophy of its own. Yet both of these assumptions are open to considerable doubt. The Bible does not make the former distinction, but instead portrays the Way of God as permeating and governing every aspect of human life. There is nothing "secular" (i.e., spiritually neu­tral) in life, according to the Bible-no law which is not to be regarded as a religious law.[2]  Everything is, or ought to be, viewed as impinging upon the sacred. For ultimately, "Christ is all, and in all."[3] Anyone who adopts this biblical point of view is therefore not committing a category mistake in treating religious statements about cities and kingdoms as relevant to worldly politics, as long as it is understood that the political system which the Bible presents refers to a (logically) higher or deeper level of "politics" than any worldly systems.[4] The real category mistake occurs when some­one be­lieves political agreements can be wholly separated from religious commit­ments, as if they were two realities standing side by side (on the same logi­cal level)!

 

      The second assumption, that the Bible itself offers no distinct political philosophy, can be refuted only by examining the text more closely, to see what it actually says about politics. In so doing, we shall find that, as Stringfellow rightly observes, "Biblical politics are alienated from the poli­tics of this age" [S6:13].  Nevertheless, if we know what to look for [see above, pp.1-4], we shall discover that the Bible does present a surprisingly consistent vision of politics. Indeed, it contains far too much material to cover exhaustively in a book such as this. Accordingly, this chapter can provide no more than a general overview of what I see as the main points.

 

Politics in the Old Testament

 

      IfweturnfirsttotheOldTestament,thefirstpointtonoteisthatpolitics -that is, people's agreement to control or allow themselves to be con­trolled by other people-is not part of the original image of God. Genesis 1 tells us mankind is given the task of ruling over "the earth", which is said to include plants, fish, birds, and creeping animals [1:28-29], but not other human beings! In Genesis 2 we see that other human beings (as repre­sented by Eve) are intended to serve as "helpers" in the task of subduing the earth [2:18]-co-workers under the direction of God. The first hint of worldly politics arises in Genesis 3, as a direct result of Eve's attempt to grasp wis­dom and exercise authority over Adam [3:6]. After she eats the forbidden fruit, God tells Eve "your husband...shall rule over you" [3:16]. This ar­rangement replaces the original agreement between God and man (which might be called "natural politics" [see below, Chapter Six]), according to which Adam and his helper were allowed to enjoy the fruit of all but one of the trees in the garden.

 

      In the concluding chapter of the creation story, Genesis 4, we read that Cain, the first-born son of Adam and Eve, kills his younger brother out of jealousy and then goes away and builds a city [4:17]. In light of the political connotations of the word "city" [see above, pp.1-3], this story can be interpreted as a picture of how politics arises directly out of man's attempt to run away from God. The first full-fledged political unit mentioned in the Bible is depicted as one of the first and most concrete results of human evil.

 

      The rest of the Old Testament can be regarded as an extended exposition on this same theme, demonstrating why all forms of worldly politics (i.e., politics instigated by human beings) are bound to fail. After the first city is founded, we are told, such wide­spread corruption and violence develops [Gen. 6:12-13] that God decides to destroy everyone except Noah and his family, and start over again. But after the flood Noah's descendants confer together and say "Come, let us build for ourselves a city, and a tower whose top will reach into heaven" [11:4]. Genesis 11 says God "came down to see the city and the tower" [11:5], and decided to "confuse their language" [11:7] to prevent them from becoming too powerful [11:6]. As a result the people "stopped building the city" [11:8] and named the city (not the tower!) "Babel" (which means "lip" or "language") [11:9]. So once again man's agreement with man in the form of a city becomes the root of human evil and results in alienation from God.[5]After this, God decides to choose one person, Abram, and build from him "a great nation" [12:1-2], apparently in the hopes that at least one group can learn how to follow God instead of being bound by human power-games.

 

      The name eventually given to this great nation is "Israel", which in Hebrew means "he struggles with God" [Gen. 32:28]. Significantly, when God gives Jacob this name, he repeats the promise he had given to Abraham, but then adds "And kings shall come forth from you" [35:11], thus hinting that mankind's struggle with God is to take a political form even for the chosen people.

 

      The first king of the nation Israel comes, however, not as a gift from God, but as a reluctant concession to the complaints of the people, who, as we read in 1 Samuel 8, were dissatisfied with the corrupt ways of the younger priests, and so asked Samuel, the High Priest, to "appoint a king for us to judge us like all the nations" [8:3-5]. When Samuel asks God for guidance on the matter, God's answer is unambiguous: "Listen to the voice of the people..., for they have not rejected you, but they have rejected me from being king over them.... [H]owever, you shall solemnly warn them and tell them of the procedure of the king who will reign over them" [8:7,9]. Samuel obeys, and gives the people a long list of the different ways in which their freedom will be restricted, and evil will come upon them, as a direct result of having a king.[6] Chapter 8 ends with Samuel ex­claiming to the people: "Go every man to his city" [8:22]-in other words, "Prepare yourselves for politics!"

 

      And politics of the worst kind is just what the people of Israel experience throughout much of the remainder of the Old Testament. The string of kings we read about are mostly corrupt, and even the good ones sometimes end up misusing their power at the expense of the citizens.[7] As a result of their failure to obey God consistently under the political order they had de­manded, God allows the people to be conquered and taken captive on several occasions. This means that the two things they feared most, which served as the occasion for their demand to have a king [see p.47n below], end up coming to pass anyway: not only are the people sometimes treated unjustly by their own corrupt kings, but they are attacked by nations with strong kings in spite of (or perhaps because of) having their own king.

 

      The lesson in all of this, for the Christian at least, is that the "Old Covenant" can never fulfill its purpose. God had spoken to the people through Moses and given them a set of laws. But instead of internalizing these laws and following their spirit, they externalized them and formed them into a kind of "golden calf": i.e., a set of rules and regulations which could serve as a political agreement between the people and their leaders, and which therefore lent themselves naturally to abuse [see Appendix A]. Thus we read in Isaiah 28:13-15 that the true "boast" of those "who rule this people in Jerusalem" is:

 

 

We have entered into a covenant with death,

with the grave we have made an agreement.

...for we have made a lie our refuge and falsehood our hiding place.

 

 

As a result, they will hear from the Lord nothing but the meaningless echo of their own political babbling:

 

 

Do and do, do and do,

rule on rule, rule on rule;

a little here, a little there ...

 

 

Indeed, the whole story of the state of Israel can be regarded as an extended example of the evil that results when people wish to control God by making his Law into a tool of human government, rather than allowing the govern­ment of human hearts to be used as a tool of God!

 

Politics in the Gospels

 

      The Old Testament's overall account of the political aspects of man­kind's struggle with God is summarized symbolically by king Nebuchadnezzar's dream of a statue with a golden head and feet of clay [Dan. 2:31-45]; for this suggests no man-made political system will ever have the strength or endurance to stand on its own feet, no matter how pure (like gold) its ideology is. Fortunately, the New Testament offers an alternative, by rejecting what the people of Israel had been fooled all too often into believing-viz., the idea that they could be saved by following a set of external laws. The "New Covenant", according to which God's law is written on the heart of each person, was foreshadowed in the Old Testament [e.g., Jer. 31:33], but did not come fully into view until Jesus demonstra­ted through his life and teachings just how this new Way operates.

 

      Jesus' ministry begins as soon as he has resisted three severe temptations, at least one of which is explicitly political.[8]Satan offers to give Jesus power over all the kingdoms of the earth if only he will bow down and worship him. Jesus ignores Satan's bold claim to control this power and replies simply that God alone is worthy of worship.[9] Jesus must have known that if he tried to grasp after such external power, it would slip through his fingers like sand [cf. Mat. 7:24-27]. In fact, he may well have believed that his status as the Son of God gave him the right to possess those kingdoms; yet he recognized that the only way to gain what was due to him was to give it up.

 

      In his teachings Jesus repeatedly emphasizes the political im­plications of this insight. Most of Jesus' parables are concerned with encouraging his followers to see politics from a new perspective by seeking after the "kingdom of heaven" which exists in their hearts, rather than placing their hope in ordinary worldly kingdoms [see below, pp.69-73]. Accordingly, immediately after offer­ing to give Peter "the keys of the kingdom of heaven" [Mat. 16:19], Jesus severely rebukes him for not understanding that the way of God's kingdom involves suffering and death [16:25]: "Get behind me, Satan!", he exclaims, "You are a stumbling block to me; for you are not setting your mind on God's interests, but man's" [16:23]. Likewise, Judas is regarded as the instrument of Satan [Lk. 22:3] because he wanted Jesus to set up a worldly political kingdom.

 

      But Jesus' strongest condemnation of all is reserved for those who used relatively insignificant religious rules and regulations as a quasi-politi­cal means of forcing others to act in a certain way, thus neglecting the "weightier" matters of "justice and mercy and faithfulness" [Mat. 23:23]. Jesus calls the Pharisees an evil "brood of vipers" [12:34; 23:33; see also 3:7], "hypocrites" [e.g., 23:23] and "blind guides" [e.g., 23:16,24], not be­cause their ideas were evil, but because they took good, spiritual ideas and politicized them to promote their own selfish purposes. Thus Jesus charges them with having committed the only unforgivable sin, "blasphemy against the Spirit" [12:31], which involves taking the Law that applies to the heart (i.e., the Law of the Spirit [cf. Rom. 8:2-11]) out of its proper context and forcing it upon someone else through political lawmaking.[10] A good example of how they did this is given in the story of the woman caught in adultery [Jn. 8:1-11]. By showing the Pharisees that they were all condemned by the same internal Law, he demonstrated the inadequacy of any philosophy of life based on (supposedly absolute) external laws instead of on this (truly absolute) Law of love [cf. Rom.13:8].

 

      Most importantly, Jesus practiced what he preached. He conquered death by dying willingly. At the very moment of Jesus' death, the Gospel writers tell us, "the veil of the temple was torn in two from top to bottom" [Mat. 27:51]. The veil of the temple kept the written "Law of God" hidden in a special, holy place, where only certain privileged people could enter. As long as the Law remained separated and external in this way, it was actually a curse for the people. Thus, the tearing of the veil is clearly a symbol of how Jesus, by choosing the Way of the Spirit and therefore dying to the ways of the world, breaks the curse that causes people to misuse the Law. As Paul puts it: "Christ redeemed us from the curse of the Law, having become a curse for us" [Gal. 3:13; cf. 2 Cor. 5:21].

 

The Bible's Ultimate Affirmation of Politics

 

      So far it looks as if I am arguing that the Bible is totally against all forms of politics. Yet this is not the case. For, although Jesus was taken out of the city to be crucified (representing his lack of dependence on political solutions), his resurrection occurred inside the city (representing his ultimately political goal of establishing God's kingdom). This can be regarded as a symbol of the political hope at the heart of the Christian message, a hope often expressed by characterizing the life of faith as one that looks forward to a new kind of political unit-i.e., to a new "house", "city" or "country" [e.g., 2 Cor. 5:1-4; Heb. 11:8-16; 12:22; 13:14; see also Mat. 5:14]. Paul leaves no doubt about the implications this final goal of both human and divine endeavor has for worldly politics when he says the end time will arrive "when [Christ] delivers up the kingdom to the God and Father, when he has abolished all rule and all authority and power", so that "all things are sub­jected to him" and "God may be all in all."[11]

 

      Along these lines, the last book of the Bible culminates with an elaborate vision of a "holy city, new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, made ready as a bride adorned for her husband" [Rev. 21:2; see also 21:10]. In this picture of the ultimate union of heaven and earth, the powers of democracy and all other worldly political systems finally give way to what can be called a "politics of love" [see below, Chapter Seven], with everyone equally subjected in absolute commitment to God, and receiving absolute freedom in return. The establishment of this union is foreshadowed throughout the book, but nowhere more profoundly than in the heavenly response to the sounding of the seventh angel's trumpet: "and there arose loud voices in heaven, saying, 'The kingdom of the world has become the kingdom of our Lord, and of his Christ; and he will reign forever and ever'" [11:15; see also 11:17-18].

 

      The technical term for the kind of political system described in such passages, one that aims to establish a divine political order on earth, with God alone as the ultimate guiding power, is "theocracy" (i.e., "God-rule").[12] Once we recognize that a universal theocracy is the political goal towards which the entire Bible points, and that it is pictured as a city which comes out of heaven and is established on earth, it becomes clear that all the Bible's warnings about the dangers of depending on man-made political systems refer only to non-theocratic political systems. In other words, the hope of the "theocrat" is not just for an eternally pleasant life after death (so-called "pie in the sky when you die"); rather, it is that, by promoting non-attachment to purely worldly political systems, we can be freed to help bring the earth itself one step closer to opening its arms to receive the gift of the heavenly politic, which alone can bring mankind lasting peace.

 

      There is, in fact, one book in the Bible which I believe gives us brief glimpses of what theocracy on earth could be like, and suggests that in spite of its idealistic overtones, it ought to be considered as a viable option even today. In describing the early days of Israel's occupation of the Promised Land, the book of Judges tells us that, when the people had a problem or needed to make a decision, they were supposed to consult God, then wait until they saw clearly the direction in which he was pointing them. On several occasions, including the last verse in the book, we read the following description of life during this early period of Israel's history: "In those days there was no king in Israel; every man did what was right in his own eyes" [Jud. 17:6; 21:25; see also 18:1 and 19:1].

 

      This statement is almost always assumed to have an entirely negative connotation, inasmuch as "right in his own eyes" seems to mean "wrong in God's eyes". Indeed, some scholars regard it as the author's explanation for why a king was necessary, though the text never states this explicitly. Yet Deuteronomy 12:1-11 seems to imply that it was God's intention that they follow this lawless system, "every man doing whatever is right in his own eyes", until the people reach their "resting place" across the Jordon. That is, only when  God gives them "rest from all [their] enemies" will the Law of Moses finally be implemented. This clearly had not yet come about during the time of Judges, since we read that God allowed their enemies to remain in the land as a "test" of their faithfulness to him [Jud. 2:22-23]. In other words, the system may have failed not because it was the wrong system, but because the people continually perverted it by trying to take control of God's power and give it to a human being (a "judge"). As we shall see in Chapter Four, such a perversion of theocracy is an ever-present danger, but it does not invalidate the attempt to implement true theocracy.

 

      This system of self-ruling, surprisingly devoid of externally enforced laws-the Law of Moses is never mentioned in Judges-repeatedly fell prey to the same type of political distortion. Time after time the people "did evil in the sight of the Lord" [Jud. 2:11; 3:7,12; 4:1; 6:1; 10:6; 13:1]. God would punish the people's evil deeds by sending some form of oppression upon them, nearly always political [e.g., 3:12]. After this they would call out to God, who would send a temporary leader to save them [3:15]. The people would then live in peace for a time [3:30], until they once again fell into evil and the cycle would begin again.

 

      What is often ignored is the fact that, despite the continual failure of the people, God was trying to teach them a political lesson, and that the few times they caught a glimpse of it, the system worked for as long as the people accepted God as their ruler.[13] Perhaps the best description of this "lesson" comes in the story of Gideon, who refused to make the political mistake which kept the cycle of evil going. After winning a decisive battle under the leadership of Gideon, the people of Israel do the very thing God was trying to teach them not to do: they ask Gideon to "rule over us, both you and your son, also your son's son" [Jud. 8:22]. But Gideon's response shows that at least one person has learned the lesson: "I will not rule over you, nor shall my son rule over you; the Lord shall rule over you."[14]

 

      The stories in Judges suggest that theocracy can be regarded as a religiously enlightened "autocracy" (in the literal sense of "self-rule"). As such, the relationship which is most closely analogous to theocracy (in the manner of the family relationships in Aristotle's framework of political systems [see Table 1]) would be that between a person and himself or herself. This, of course, is not so much a family relationship, as the founda­tion of all one's relationships. We must keep in mind, however, that such a relationship is only truly theocratic when we regard ourselves as dwelling in God and/or vice versa [see pp.29-30n above], so that, along with St. Augustine, we regard God as being nearer to us than we are to ourselves.[15]A person who observes a theocracy from the outside, who looks at it with the world's eyes rather than God's, would therefore see the lack of an ex­ternally en­forced code of laws and would probably regard it as anarchy![16] But this is the price which must be paid: someone who does not believe in God will look at the theocrat as a fool [cf. 1 Cor. 1:18-25].

 

      Christianity explains how what looks like self-rule can in reality be God-rule by saying God's Spirit lives within the human spirit, and informs us of the proper way to go at every step. Thus John says "you have no need for any one to teach you", because "his anointing teaches you about all things" [1 Jn. 2:27; see also Jn. 14:26 and 16:13]. This does not mean that education is entirely worthless, or that schools and universities are always of the Devil, but that no one should allow another human being or human system to be the master of one's spirit (whether it be by means of so-called education, religion, politics, or any other method of influencing another person's spirit), but should stay in tune with God's Spirit, and treat this as the absolute authority in all matters. Yet theocracy does not require us to be self-centered, locking ourselves up in a completely private relation­ship between ourselves and God. On the contrary, its "first and greatest" inner Law requires a love of God that compels us to reach out and love our neighbor with the same love the Spirit has taught us to apply to ourselves [Deut. 6:5; Lev. 19:18; Mat. 22:36-40]. It is tragic to think how few Christians take seriously the Bible's call to this theocratic way of life.

 

The Risks of A Non-Political Political System

 

      The main problem with theocracy, and the reason I believe it is so diffi­cult to implement without perverting its intended form [see Chapter Four], is that it requires people to have enough faith in God to make themselves vulnerable to abuse, both from their fellow countrymen and from outside invaders.[17] Theocracy requires indivi­duals to take an absolute risk with their very lives, just as Jesus did at Gethsemane, by resisting the temptation to appeal to man-made laws or human saviors for self-protection against unfair treatment. It flies in the face of ordinary worldly rationality by claiming the way to have true life is to die. The rationale for living in this way was never entirely clear to God's people, except to specially gifted individuals such as Abraham and Gideon, until Jesus came to show how everyone can live by the "way of the cross" [see Mat. 16:24-25].

 

     Christianity is at its core a religion of the cross, which says if we want to live for God we must learn how to suffer and die, to sacrifice everything and endure all manner of injustices in order to follow the call of God resounding in our heart. Unlike worldly power, "[theocratic] power is perfected in weakness" [2 Cor. 12:9]. Accordingly, Jesus taught and demonstrated that the "power" [kratos] upon which theocracy is based is the sacrificial power of "meekness", the very opposite of the notion of power upon which the world's political systems are based. When Jesus says the meek "shall inherit the earth" [Mat. 5:5], he is saying that the very thing the world's political powers most desire to possess will be freely given to those who are willing to give up their right to have it-those who are willing to suffer and even to die at the hands of the ones who believe they can possess the earth merely by grasping it.[18]With this hope in mind theocracy not only can become a reality for anyone who chooses to be absolutely committed to God, but is already a reality because of how perfectly Jesus himself followed this Way of love and death [see e.g., Jn. 16:33].

 

      Theocracy, therefore, is the system the Bible presents as God's way of establishing peace and order in human society [see Y1:112-113]. Conflicts are to be resolved not by appealing to some external law, but by individuals mutually seeking inner guidance from God, and as a result, following the Way of self-giving love demonstrated by Jesus. Inasmuch as theocracy is a non-political kind of political system [cf. E1:140], the question of the possibility of Christian politics must in a sense be answered by saying it is not possible: "Christian politics" is a contradiction in terms as long as "politics" is taken as referring to human power struggles, which inevitably enslave us to the world; for Christianity frees us from our self-imposed bondage to the world! Hence, the only "Christian politics" acknowledged in the Bible is the type that rejects the idea that merely human government can be an ade­quate means of maintaining peace and order.

 

      Theocracy warns that a Christian who chooses to lend active support to one of the worldly political systems must be careful not to be fooled into regarding that system as intrinsically good, for to do so is to miss the whole point of the Christian message. Christian politics is biblically possible only by putting to death our worldly desires to secure more rights and more power for ourselves, so that the worldly-based political order can give way to a spiritually-based political order which springs up in the heart of each individual.

 

      Anyone who professes to be a Christian, and who regards the Bible as a reliable guideline for life, ought to treat this issue of the possibility of theocracy with the utmost sincerity. For the Bible clearly teaches that theocracy is our only hope for building a world in which people can live in peace and harmony with each other. Just as Kant answers the question "How are synthetic propositions a priori possible?" [see above, p.4] by "deny[ing] knowledge in order to make room for faith" [K1:xxx], so also the vision of biblical theocracy solves the parallel problem of Christian politics by requir­ing us to deny the independent validity of all worldly political systems in order to make room for faith in the government of God![19]