According to the bible, should Christians be involved in politics?
- Thread starter Houseman
- Start date
Let's start with the Great Commandment then:
“'The Lord our God, the Lord is one. And you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.' The second is this: 'You shall love your neighbor as yourself.' There is no other commandment greater than these."
If you love seeing yourself out of harm; so you should do so for your neighbor. And if involving yourself in politics would keep harm away from them, then the Bible commands you to get involved.
Finally the definition of "neighbor". From my part, I use the missionary POV and consider it synonym to "humankind", because Christianity isn't something people is born with; it is teached and anyone can become a Christian. After all, God didn't die just for the Christian's sins; but for everyone's.
“'The Lord our God, the Lord is one. And you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.' The second is this: 'You shall love your neighbor as yourself.' There is no other commandment greater than these."
If you love seeing yourself out of harm; so you should do so for your neighbor. And if involving yourself in politics would keep harm away from them, then the Bible commands you to get involved.
Finally the definition of "neighbor". From my part, I use the missionary POV and consider it synonym to "humankind", because Christianity isn't something people is born with; it is teached and anyone can become a Christian. After all, God didn't die just for the Christian's sins; but for everyone's.
How does that reconcile with the verses I posted in the OP about staying separate from the world?
It seems like, taking these verses together, the message is "love your neighbor as yourself... keep harm away from them... so long as you do not involve yourself in the world".
For example, say that harm is coming to you and your neighbor in the form of insurgents from a neighboring country, coming to enslave you both.
Do you join the army of your country and fight and kill in order to protect yourself and your neighbors?
What about your "neighbors" from the other country that you're killing? Do they not count?
If you get involved in politics, would you be voting to send troops to kill, in order to protect your 'neighbor'? Is that any different?
Also, when they wanted to make Jesus the literal 'king of the Jews', he ran from them. Couldn't he have protected a lot of his 'neighbors' from the harm inflicted by the Roman empire if he would have become King? Maybe Jerusalem wouldn't have fallen. You're not saying that Jesus was guilty of ignoring his own command, right?
It doesn't. God and "love your neighbor as yourself" have priority above the "do not involve yourself in the world" interpretation; because any interpretation that doesn't put the Great Commandment above everything else isn't Christian (after all, there is no other greater commandment).
What about the rest of my post, where I give examples of harming one neighbor in order to 'protect' another? This isn't putting a 'lesser' commandment above the 'greatest' commandment, it's demonstrating how the greatest commandment can be in conflict with itself unless these lesser commandments are respected.
A Christian would want to do EVERYTHING God commands. I've never heard of such a thing like a hierarchy of commands, where it's okay to ignore the lesser commandments as long as you're doing the greater ones, or that one would ever supersede another
That's why there aren't any "Christians". There are Catholics, Adventists, Anabaptists, Anglicans, Baptists, Calvinists, Evangelicals, Lutherans, Methodists, etc. Different branches that have different priorities in their interpretation of the Bible. However, I frequently have heard those two are the greater commandments, and they are the core of Christianity.
So, again, what about the rest of my post? When is it justified to kill or order others to kill your "neighbors" from across the border?
Also, when they wanted to make Jesus the literal 'king of the Jews', he ran from them. Couldn't he have protected a lot of his 'neighbors' from the harm inflicted by the Roman empire if he would have become King? Maybe Jerusalem wouldn't have fallen. You're not saying that Jesus was guilty of ignoring his own command, right?
Feel free to answer these questions from any lens you wish.