We know from both biblical revelation and from experience that the state is violence. Experientially, we know that the primary distinction between the state and other institutions which organize our society is that the state can take our money and create rules which are enforced by the threat of violence and incarceration–something no business (apart from organized crime enterprises) can do. As Tolstoy wrote in his book The Slavery of Our Times:
“Laws are rules, made by people who govern by means of organised violence for non-compliance with which the non-complier is subjected to blows, to loss of liberty, or even to being murdered.”
Similarly, the Bible tells us that rulers carry a sword to carry out wrath against wrongdoers (Romans 13) and that Christians should pray for government leaders so that we may live unmolested by the violence which states visit upon those who gain their attention (1 Timothy 2:2). This further supports the notion that the state is violence.
But here’s the rub. Unlike the state, followers of Christ are, almost by definition, nonviolent.
Many Christians throughout church history have argued that if the state sometimes serves a divine role by punishing evildoers, as Paul seems to claim in Romans 13:4, it should be not only acceptable but desirable for Christians to participate in state violence. But in the same place where we read that the state can be a tool of the vengeance and wrath of God, we read that Christians are never to avenge themselves, never be a medium for God’s wrath, but must always overcome evil with good (Romans 12:19-21). More famously, in Jesus’ sermon on the mount, Christians are told to turn the other cheek (Matthew 5:39), love their enemies (5:44), and live as peacemakers (5:9).
If the state is violence, though, how can Christians support its existence, even tacitly? A popular argument for allowing the state to continue, and thus for state violence, is that when a government is absent an order will arise anyway and that this order will likely be more violent and aggressive than a state intentionally organized to maximize justice and order. In other words, a little aggression stops a lot of aggression. This was precisely the argument which America’s founding fathers invoked for the creation of their constitutional republic. As the Declaration of Independence tells us:
“We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.–That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men…”
According to this philosophy, government is a necessary lesser evil which is ordained by God and initiated by men to allow for more human freedom and flourishing than could be possible if the state were abolished. Christians in the Anabaptist tradition see governments as making up one kingdom that God has instituted for the regulation of the behavior of sinners while Christians make up a nonviolent kingdom living side by side with the governments of men.
However, these kingdoms are so separate in the traditional Anabaptist mindset that Christians are not to even play an activist role in protesting state evil–we are called to be strict non-participants, letting the state do its thing while trying to live apart from it.
A more moderate position will acknowledge that Christians cannot participate in state violence, but leave room for peaceful activism against the state. But what is the goal of that activism–to destroy the state or reform it?
The Reform View. The notion that some state violence is necessary–only as much as is needed to preserve the greatest exercise of human rights to life, liberty, and property–is called minarchism. A Christian who is a minarchist in theory, because she believes that God intends the state to maintain peace and punish evil until the kingdom of God comes in its fullness, would still practice separation from government violence due to Jesus’ teaching that the kingdom of God, which counts all Christians as its citizens, is not of this world (John 18:36). She would also prefer a state with limited power so that Christians like herself “may lead a peaceful and quiet life” (1 Timothy 2:2).
The Destruction View. The Christian who takes Jesus’ condemnation of violence to be a universal maxim for all mankind and not just a command for Christians will likely engage in positive action on behalf of the peaceful (which is to say persuasive instead of coercive) destruction of all state aggression.
However, the removal of state aggression does not mean that there will be no violence at all. Christians would still have to work out their participation in self defense, policing (whether privately or community run), and the general protection (potentially by force) of life, liberty, and property rights. Until Jesus comes back or everyone is spiritually changed, these basic functions of society must be performed somehow.
Therefore it seems that even if there is some room for activism or participation on the part of Christians toward the state, some form of conscientious separation will likely always be necessary for followers of Jesus living this side of the Lord’s return.