Torture and the Christian Narrative

Here is an article I wrote (only 3 pages) on an issue that made the news earlier this summer. Of course, it functions in the secular world as another reason why Christians and Christianity cannot be trusted as a guide to balanced moral living. What struck me is the way in which understanding the authority of scripture in terms of the narrative of a suffering self-sacrificial God helped to clarify the issue. So here we are to this posting.

Evangelical attitudes concerning torture have been in the public spotlight in the past few weeks. This scrutiny stems from the April 29th release of poll numbers taken by the Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life. This poll, found that 62 percent of white evangelical Protestants said torture of suspected terrorists could be often or sometimes justified to obtain important information. The conclusion is the more a person goes to church, the more likely they support torture. These revelations have induced considerable soul-searching among evangelicals according to a May 16 AP story (“Torture debate prompts evangelical soul-searching” by Eric Gorski). Ethicist David Gushee observed that Christians have often failed to be adequately committed to scripture when it comes to the sacredness of life, including the lives of our enemies. In reading his comments, I could not help but wonder how it applies to me and my attitudes about torture.
How I would answer the poll question and why? I find that my own initial impulse is to place national security above all other concerns. We Christians tend to be a law-and-order crowd. Who wants to let terrorists keep information to themselves especially when it would be helpful to protect human lives? If torture is what it takes to pry valuable information out, torture at will! This is indeed my initial impulse. Research has found, as reported in the same story, that often Christian ethical reasoning is based upon common sense rather than upon theological and biblical reflection. Let’s try to remedy this deficit here.
Does Gushee’s critique apply to me? Am I not taking the teachings of Jesus Christ concerning love for enemies (primarily in the Sermon on the Mount, Matt 5:43-48) seriously enough? One way I have increasingly understood the authority of scripture is to think in terms of the broader story scripture tells. In other words, for the Christian, the scripture’s great power functions primarily as divine narrative. That is, the Bible is a grand story of God’s great acts of redemption ultimately in Jesus Christ. We believe God was born into a body of human weakness like ours to break the power of sin and set captives free for divine worship and service. In this story we cannot fail to notice that God chose not to respond to sin through violence (even though he could and might have saved lives accordingly), but through self-sacrificial love which came to a climax at Calvary. God embraced the pain of relationship with a sinful humanity on the cross. Some could point to Old Testament violence as warrant for torture but Christians have long affirmed that it is through Christ primarily that our understanding of God is to be shaped. And there is no manipulation in this gospel story, only self-giving love.
Some could argue that I’m misunderstanding the violence inherent in the Christian narrative itself, primarily in terms of hell. Accordingly, God himself is not unwilling to resort to violence in the end-game since he sends sinners to an eternity of torment. I would argue that many biblical passages – Romans 2 is a primary example - portray the wrath of God not as divine judgment but divine abandonment. That is, God’s wrath, at the end of the day, is not so much bringing damnation on the sinner but permission for the sinner to experience the self-inflicted results of their separation from God. Hell, by this understanding, is the logical extension of a life of resisting the divine will. God ultimately lets those who resist divine mercy and grace have their way so as to experience eternal isolation. Be sure, there is perverse pleasure in hell; that of the lost soul shaking his or her fist at God for eternity saying, “I never bent my knee to your will!” So hell can be understood as non-manipulative, non-coercive and even non-violent. True violence would occur if God forced those who wished to remain alone to endure the pleasures of eternity with the righteous.
Let’s apply the logic of the Christian narrative to the question of torture. If God chooses not to respond to sin with violence but with self-sacrificial love, then Gushee’s critique seems to be deeply valid. As a Christian, it seems I ought not support torture under any circumstances. To support torture is to act out of step with the authoritative Christian narrative. Christians are called to live out the Jesus story so that our witness bears faithfulness to its inner logic. Torture involves acts of violence for the sake of self-protection against our known enemies. We are called to embrace the dangers and risks involved in living in a world gone awry as God did in Christ.
Jesus’ command to love our enemies (Matthew 5:43-48) must be understood in this broader interpretive narrative. The narrative understanding of scriptural authority is critical especially in this regard. Some people take Jesus’ words from the Sermon on the Mount to refer only to their personal ethic: that is, Jesus commands me personally not take vengeance or resort to torture but I can support government actions to do so. Paul seems to do just this in Romans 13:1-7 where he affirms the role of governments to use violence to advance the public good. He even commands Christians to love each other in verse 8ff. There we have it: we are called to non-violence in our personal lives (love one another even our personal enemies) yet to affirm the authority of governments in the public sector that will sometimes include violence (authorities don’t bear the sword in vain). This easy and comfortable logic held the day for me until I began to take seriously the narrative authority of scripture.
If the narrative perspective is correct, non-violence cannot simply be relegated to the private sector. God operates by loving the sinner self-sacrificially on a cosmic and public arena. Jesus notes the cosmic implications of God’s non-manipulative nature in Matt 5:45 saying God sends rain on the just and the unjust alike. Therefore we should love our enemies as God who shows no distinction. If we allow the big picture of God’s purposes in the world take precedence, we cannot simply minimize the teachings of Jesus to the private sector. Jesus is our clearest window on the very nature of God. Jesus illustrates these principles of non-coercion in his teachings and at the cross. If to be virtuous is to be godly, and to be godly is to act like God, according to the Christian story, followers of Jesus should seemingly never support torture in any sense. According to our story, God’s self-giving love will conquer all and is more effective than manipulation anyway. You cannot force sinners to repent just the way torture often makes information gained less reliable.
So if we insist on giving precedence to Jesus’ teachings, we have to come back to Rom 13 and ask, “Why did Paul say something so out-of-sync with the divine plan? Did he simply misunderstand?” Paul clearly recognizes the beneficial role of the state in using violence (the sword – in v. 4) to sustain public quiet and welfare. Paul seems to be conceding here that in the intervening period between Christ’s first and second coming, governments have a useful role to play which will sometimes include violence. It is hard to disagree with this common-sense perspective and the application to torture is self-evident.
Paul’s teaching must be read in the light of the political realities of the first century. Paul wanted to make clear that the gospel he preached had no insurrectionist implications. Aspirations of Jewish autonomy were alive and well when Paul wrote. These aspirations, ten years later, in AD 66, led to a major Jewish revolt against Rome which brought about the destruction of Jerusalem and its temple and left thousands of Jews dead. Jesus’ teachings should also be read against this backdrop: that is, loving your enemies immediately meant loving (and praying for!) the Romans. Jesus is also rejecting insurrection against Rome as a mechanism for advancing the Kingdom of God (a popular notion in the day). So Jesus’ and Paul’s teachings have a similar backdrop and purpose: no bearing arms against the government no matter how tempting.
But how can we account for the fact that Paul seems to go further by affirming the role of the sword? We cannot simply say, “The sword represents authority generally.” No, the sword is unambiguously an implement of violence and Paul says governments use the sword as servants of God’s justice (Rom 13:6). Here perhaps I feel compelled to compromise. On the one hand, the church must consistently bear witness to God’s non-violent narrative to be faithful disciples of our Lord. Yet, we with Paul, can recognize that in this world, there are times when governments will be required to resort to violence. To be faithful, we can perhaps say that violence (torture in this case) is acceptable only under extreme circumstances. Rather than often or sometimes being acceptable (as the poll indicates most evangelicals presently believe), perhaps it would be best to say torture is rarely acceptable. Christians like Paul could affirm the role of the state while personally refraining from participation in all acts of coercion.
Here are some suggested circumstances. Torture could be acceptable only when dealing with 1) a known terrorist who 2) is almost certain to have knowledge of future attacks, when 3) this intelligence is likely to be actionable so as to save many lives and 4) all other non-violent measures have been taken and 5) the timing is such that information is immediately necessary and 6) torture has been shown to be an effective tool of attaining reliable information. The last point itself is highly unlikely since torture itself tends to taint information. With such strictures in place, we may be able to affirm that we are doing our utmost to love the enemy while recognizing the role of government to assure public welfare and safety. Torture, accordingly, is rarely if ever theologically licit.
Furthermore, I would personally be unwilling to participate in torture and would encourage other disciples of Jesus to make the same choice. While this may strike some as a half-measure, in a world of tremendous moral ambiguity, it is a posture that strives for faithfulness to the non-violent nature of the Christian narrative while realistic to the duties of those in government to provide for national security. Torture is not only dehumanizing to the tortured but to the torturer. I wish to thank Drs. Cindy Wesley, Manning Garrett and Matthew Francis and Ben Kickert for their helpful insights in writing this piece. Most of them disagree thinking that torture should never in any circumstances be allowable. I find myself inclined to agree but not willing to eliminate torture in special cases as outlined here and for these reasons.