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The Just War Tradition

A summary by Revd John Reardon of his address to the URCPF Annual Meeting Nov 2006

The question of whether war can be justified is particularly acute for Christians because the earliest church stance was quite clear. Jesus had inaugurated a nonviolent movement evidenced by his teaching, his life and above all by the way he faced his own death.

The seminal text in his teaching is the Sermon on the Mount and, in particular, its beginning in the Beatitudes, in which Jesus describes a way of being far removed from thoughts and actions that could harm others. Matthew chapters 5 - 7 are an extended treatise on what life is like when God’s rule is the governing principle. Luke sums up the teaching succinctly in chapter 6 verse 35, “But love your enemies… Be merciful, just as your Father is merciful”. An iconic moment is found in Matthew chapter 26 when Jesus orders the disciple to put his sword back into its sheath “for all who take the sword will perish by the sword”. In Jesus peace is proclaimed and demonstrated as the way in which people should relate to one another. In him the peace prophecies of the Old Testament are fulfilled.

From the writings of St Paul to those of the early church Fathers nonviolence was extolled because living in Christ demanded it. It was a mark of the reign of God. Tertullian wrote, “in disarming Peter Christ unbelted every soldier”, and a century or more later Origen, writing against the pagan Celsus who had attacked Christians for being disloyal because they refused to serve in the army, asserted that Christians had “become children of peace, for the sake of Jesus”.

It is generally thought that the change came early in the Fourth Century when Constantine became Emperor. In 303 CE Diocletian forbade any member of the Roman army to be Christian but by 416 CE no one could join the army unless he was Christian. The transformation was complete. From being a persecuted minority, Christians had become a dominant presence within Roman society and they had to face up to the challenge of government and the maintenance of security.

It was Augustine of Hippo (354 - 430 CE) who wrote extensively about the place of Christianity as a privileged religion in support of the state. He abhorred violence and believed that Christians should offer no violence in their own defence but he faced the moral dilemma of what to do when innocent people are threatened. He concluded that it was right to use violence if necessary to defend the innocent from evil. He saw war as justifiable when undertaken for the good of society and for the restoration of peace.

From then onwards there developed the criteria by which war could be justified. Many cite Thomas Aquinas as the true initiator of the Just War Principles.

It is not always appreciated that the Just War criteria are extremely rigorous and are grounded in a theology that shapes a community in the cause of justice and love for neighbours both near and far. The Just War tradition is primarily an expression of the nature of the church itself and only secondarily about speaking with political leaders.

Stanley Hauerwas consistently argues that the most powerful public statement by the church is its own life and ethos. The just war properly understood is an expression of the church’s own character.

The criteria of the Just War tradition are rigorous and extremely demanding. The criteria are as follows:

1. War must be waged by a legitimate authority.

2. It must be in a just cause (the UN Charter states that the only just cause is to defend yourself against an aggressor but the Christian understanding of just cause focuses on the plight of the neighbour).

3. War must be formally declared.

4. There must be right intention (Christians would argue that a just peace is the only right intention).

5. War must be a last resort after all other means have been exhausted.

6. There must be reasonable chance of success (which means a just war is always a limited war

There are also two particular criteria which govern the conduct of war:

* The immunity of non-combatants

* The means used must be proportionate to the ends.

The Just War doctrine developed in Christianity as an exception to the general presumption that the right way was through nonviolence.  The development and possession of nuclear and other weapons of mass destruction and the growth of terrorism add new dimensions to the debate among Christians but it must always be remembered that implicit in the doctrine is the presupposition that honorable defeat is preferable to using indefensible means.

Revd John Reardon is a Patron of the URC Peace Fellowship. He was Minister at Horsham (1961-1968) and Trinity St. Albans (1968-1972), was Departmental Secretary of Church and Society (1972-1990), Moderator of General Assembly (1995-1996) and General Secretary to the Council of Churches Together in Britain and Ireland.

(Revd Reardon wishes to point out that this address is simply a historical account of the JWT. It does not imply his acceptance of all its tenets and certainly not of the selective way in which politicians and some church leaders have used it to justify war — Ed.)

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