RELIGION can relate to war in different ways. First, it might directly sanction a war in the cause of a particular religion. This would be a holy war, fought in the name of a god. There are examples of this in the Hebrew Scriptures. Then, it might be recognised that if a country or group is attacked, it is necessary for them to defend themselves. So a religion might acknowledge this and set out conditions in which such defence would be legitimate and also what restraints there might be in the conduct of the war. Then, third, a religion might become totally identified with a particular nationalism.
This Companion lends itself to exploring those links in relation to Christianity, Judaism, Islam, Sikhism, Buddhism, Hinduism and Chinese traditional religion. It draws on distinguished scholars in each religion mainly, though not entirely, from the United States.
The first section of the book sets out the classical approaches of each religion, the second looks at “just war” or its equivalent in them. In Christian terms this includes both ius ad bellum, the conditions that must be met for a war to be judged legitimate, and ius in bello, the constrains that must hold even when war has broken out. The third section of this Companion looks at the link with nationalism, and includes both what is happening in India today under Narendra Modi’s BJP and American Millennialism. The fourth section considers a few specific conflicts, and includes a discussion of the female goddesses Durga and Kali.
Those who look to this book for evidence that religion has offered some restraint to human violence will, I am afraid, be disappointed. As Margo Kitts puts it, “Despite myriad laments about this association, it is indisputable that religious rhetoric has supported military aims across geographies and historical eras.” In relation to Buddhism, for example, Stephen Jenkins writes: “It has become increasingly undebatable that in penal codes and warfare ancient Buddhist cultures were no more historically pacifist than they have been in recent times.” Minority protest groups such as the Quakers or the peace churches are not included.
This comprehensive Companion offers short, scholarly surveys with bibliographies for each section. There are many areas of interest which people may wish to follow up: for example, how far the Qur’an sanctions force against non-believers, and whether there is a real difference in Mecca and Medina between what Muhammad allowed, as discussed by David Cook.
A pressing modern issue is posed by those Muslims who use violence to bring about a universal caliphate. In “The elusive dream of Pan-Islamism”, Mohammed M. Hafez considers one of the most significant factors in this: the Salafist reformation movement. For its members, the key idea of Jihad, spiritual struggle for God, becomes linked with violence to bring about a Muslim world.
Another issue of significance for today is Zionism. Robert Eisen argues that, at its inception in the 19th-century, religious Zionism was more moderate than its secular counterpart, but that, since the 1967 war, it has become a significant factor among the settlers on the West Bank and in the army, and will remain so for some time to come.
A more traditional concern might be how far it is possible to maintain a righteous state of mind even while killing people in battle. This is an issue both for Hinduism and Buddhism.
There is an excellent summary of the Christian just-war tradition by James Turner Johnson, but there is no discussion of nuclear weapons there or elsewhere in the book. This is a pity, as their advent gave rise to some of the most rigorous thinking by Christian just-war exponents in recent years, and it would have been useful to see this in relation to anything comparable in other traditions.
This book casts its net very wide to include visions of eschatological violence, as well as actual warfare. This means that the personal example of non-retaliation by Jesus is set alongside the teaching in the Gospels about final judgement and Jesus’s own designation as the Son of Man who will come with an army of angels to destroy the wicked.
While it is salutary to be reminded about this element, I am not sure that it is helpful in this discussion, because it ignores the New Testament conviction that certain actions, like judgement, belong to God, not to human beings, and that we may be called upon, a least at the personal level, to soak up suffering rather than retaliate.
The Rt Revd Lord Harries of Pentregarth is a former Bishop of Oxford, and an Hon. Professor of Theology at King’s College, London. His latest book is his autobiography, The Shaping of a Soul (John Hunt, 2023) (Books, 6 April, Podcast, 21 April).
The Cambridge Companion to Religion and War
Margo Kitts, editor
Cambridge University Press £85 (hbk); £26.99 (pbk)
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