Thoughts on Mere Christianity

"It is therefore, in my opinion, perfectly right for a Christian judge to sentence a man to death or a Christian soldier to kill an enemy.  I always have thought so, ever since I became a Christian, and long before the war, and I still think so now that we are at peace.  It is no good quoting 'Thou shalt not kill.'  There are two Greek words: the ordinary word to kill and the word to murder.  And when Christ quotes that commandment He uses the murder one in all three accounts.  Matthew Mark and Luke... I can respect an honest pacifist, though I think he is entirely mistaken." (118-119)

This passage from Mere Christianity shows that C.S. Lewis disagrees very strongly with pacifists.  It seems like deep down one reason for this might be his British heritage.  The British have ever been a warring nation, and there are many more pacifists in America than in Britain.  One of the main reasons C.S. Lewis brought this up is most likely because there was a massive war in Europe about seven years prior to the writing of the book.  Because of this war, many people were probably sick of killing seeing death.  This might have led to an influx of pacifism.  The truth is that if the allies had not defended against the axis threat, there would have most likely been even more bloodshed, and the world today would be ruled by the Nazis.  For this reason, C.S. Lewis countered pacifism in a very strong and very biblical way.  When the bible says do not murder, it is proved to mean just that by the original Greek.  Murder and killing are two very different things, and as C.S. Lewis said later in the chapter, sometimes it is a person's noble duty to kill, in order to protect other lives.

I completely agree with C.S. Lewis's view on this topic.  After all, where would this world be without the noble soldiers who gave their lives in order to protect the freedom of America and many other countries.  I certainly hope that I am never called to take another man's life, but if i am, it would not be the first time God called a person to deal out death.  We see countless occasions in the Old testament where God commanded his servants to kill His enemies, and it is easy to see why.  In this wicked world their are many people who can only be stopped by lethal force.  But above all other things, we must remember that God is the one who should be directing our sword, not ourselves.