Is War Sinful? -Cade Wood
A few years back, I decided I wanted to study apologetics, or the defense of my faith. A question I ran into a lot when I began was the question of war being a sin. It was mostly phrased as follows, "Doesn't the bible say do not murder? If so, then why do Christians fight in wars?" This interested me, so I looked into it a little bit, and this is what I discovered. Now, before I write this, this is only my opinion, and it can be wrong. I'm open minded for someone to prove me wrong, so go ahead. Anyways, I discovered that defining one's terms were vitally important to understanding this question. War was not considered murder because it was not killing with the intention to end one's life based off of selfish ambition. War, in most cases was the defending of one's land/country, or the defending of one who does not have the means to defend themselves. Now, don't get me wrong, I'm sure there probably is murder that takes place in war, but the idea of war itself, based on the intentions of the one who enters the war, is not murder. That does not mean it is not sinful, as suggested in the reading on page 3. There are bible verses referenced on war being unlawful, and I am sure in some cases it is; however, I believe war is not always a sin. I also believe there are better ways to solve problems than fighting over everything, but when there are no other options I think that going to war to defend your country is not a sin. Like i said, i could be completely wrong, so what do you guys think? Is war a sin, and how do you know?
I commented on Gray's and Madison's posts.
Dude, this is a really solid stance on the topic. With most moral questions, there are loads of situations that you have to unpack in order to reach an answer. I recently when through a stage where I questioned the perfection of God due to his command of the israelites to kill an entire nation. After much research, I came to my own conclusions but I appreciate seeing someone do that for themselves with a controversial topic rather than just repeat what has always been told to them or leave the issue alone.
ReplyDeleteI completely agree with you. I do not think the war itself is always sinful. Like you said, it is not killing with the intention of ending life for selfish reasons, it is defense. There are cases in which war could be sinful. I asked myself and my friends this question last night and most of us settled on "well yes and no." It is a hard matter to decide on.
ReplyDeleteWar in today's world is carried out in ways that was never thought of 100 years ago. An entire war could be fought today without a single man stepping foot on the battle field, whether it be through drones or through cyber attacks. Along with this, we have the "Rules of War" to help maintain a level of humanity and value for human life throughout the war. War is not inherently sin in my eyes, only when war becomes a malicious attack on a people, their ideas, or their way of life does it seem sinful to become more tainted. Again, then you could get into the issues of different cultures ideas of right/wrong and morality, but this is just a brief insight to my few.
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