Q.
How do we reconcile the Old Testament command for vengeance?
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King Jr., and to the surprise of many gathered, Jesus. Afterwards a well-
respected activist approached me away from others and asked tearfully, “Why
was this Jesus not found in my experience of church?”
This question goes to the heart of the gospel, to the heart of mission, and
to the heart of discipleship. Why is it that people can’t fi nd the hope of the
world in our churches? I think it’s directly connected to the lack of schooling
in letting God’s love through us by “loving our enemies”—to be merciful as
the triune God is merciful. Fierce Calvary-shaped love is how God has saved
us and it’s how we are to witness to our salvation. Grace is both how God has
saved us and the pattern of kingdom living for which the Holy Spirit empow-
ers us.
“Eye for an eye” is not about vengeance but the limitation of retaliation.
In Christ, violence is not only restrained but also transformed. On the cross,
God does not overcome evil with evil but with good (Rom. 12:21). There is
nothing passive about Jesus’ turning the other cheek in the face of injustice (Jn.
18:23). To turn the other cheek is to practice the provocative peace that embod-
ies the healing justice of the kingdom by exposing injustice with the presence
of love (Col. 2:15).
We don’t need to reconcile vengeance or violence with loving our
enemies. Instead, we need to be open to the Holy Spirit’s empowerment to
witness to God’s reconciling the world to Godself through the nonviolent Mes-
siah, Jesus.Rebecca Bowman Woods
A.
In Religious Literacy: What Every American Needs to Know and Doesn’t,
Stephen Prothero shares the story of a 1995 Colorado murder trial.
During deliberations, one juror pulled out his Bible and quoted
Leviticus 24, the “eye for an eye” passage that concludes with “He that killeth
a man, he shall be put to death.” After the juror instructed his fellow jurors to
go home and prayerfully consider this passage, they voted unanimously for
the death penalty.
The state Supreme Court ordered a new trial, ruling that jurors were not
allowed to consult the Bible. Some Christians, led by Colorado-based Focus
on the Family, protested the higher court’s ruling—perhaps rightly so. Can a
court really prevent people of faith from including scripture in their decision
making?
But the real injustice, in Prothero’s opinion, was that the jurors failed to
consider the rest of the Bible, particularly Jesus’ views on retaliation in Mat-
thew 5:38–42.
“There are very few passages from the Hebrew Bible that are explicitly
refuted in the New Testament, but Leviticus 24:20–21 (echoed in Ex. 21:23–25
and Deut. 19:21) is one of them,” writes Prothero, a professor of religious stud-
ies at Boston University and a staunch advocate of religious literacy.