Osama Bin Laden was killed last night. My wife and I were just about to go to bed when one last cursory glance at Facebook and Twitter told me the news. We turned on the television in time to see President Obama finishing his speech, and then it was back to the social networks for commentary.
I know why Americans were celebrating. I've seen the pictures of the people outside the White House, and, just over a mile from my apartment, I know there was a large group gathered at the World Trade Center site in lower Manhattan. Bin Laden has been America's enemy for more than a decade, and now he is no more. It feels like justice, and certainly it is a form of human justice. We understand justice to be giving someone what he deserves. But for Christians who believe that the wages of sin are death, this is a precarious definition.
Sarah Pulliam Bailey, an editor for Christianity Today, put up a very quick roundup of Christian responses she'd gathered from around Twitter as the news unfolded. The posts were predictable. Derek Webb, in his measured way, tweeted, "Don't celebrate death, celebrate justice." Jordan Sekulow suggested some celebration music, and Mark Driscoll wrote that the cheering crowds should remind us that "justice is glorious & comes ultimately through Jesus cross or hell," before taking an ill-timed and shameless jab at Rob Bell, "Justice wins."
It is clear that, from all angles, the killing of bin Laden is understood as justice, but I am going to suggest that we've conflated our human understanding of justice with God's justice. That Osama bin Laden is dead does not make the world a better place. It does not make us safer. It does not somehow magically remove a quotient of evil from the face of the earth. Russell Arben Fox, writing on the religious and moral implications of bin Laden's death for Front Porch Republic says it well, "The moral plane of the universe is not somehow improved by the killing of a man."
Death begets more death. Killing creates more killers. True, bin Laden will never again mastermind a plan to kill anyone, but someone else will. Someone else just did in the time it took to write that last sentence. And again. And again.
If we could accomplish God's justice by killing people, if the death of an evildoer at the hand of another human is what would bring about justice, Jesus would not have come to die, but to kill. If we could eventually eliminate evil from the world and mete out justice by the sword, Jesus could have wielded it wildly during his brief stay on earth and then, rather than leave us with the Holy Spirit, he might have empowered his disciples with some futuristic weaponry.
But that's not how God's justice works. And it's a good thing, too. If the punishment for evil was physical death, we would all be dead. In fact, death is the consequence of evil, but for saving grace in the person of Jesus. Death at the hands of another human is not God's justice. It was Jesus himself who warned, "All who draw the sword will die by the sword." This is not metaphorical language. This is a truism that was true before Jesus came, and remains true long after.
Thus, we don't exercise God's justice by issuing out the death we believe evildoers deserve. In fact, we hardly ever exercise God's justice at all because it is so counterintuitive to our construction of the concept. I'll be the first to say that I fail in this regard, so I'm not going to ask any readers to do better. But, I believe that what I can ask, what we can do, is understand the difference and stop conflating the two.
Osama bin Laden was evil. I still twinge with pain when I remember the way I felt for months after Sept. 11, 2001. Here on earth, he deserved to die. But, then, here on earth, so do I.
This post originally appeared at Patrolmag.com.
Follow Jonathan D. Fitzgerald on Twitter: www.twitter.com/jon_fitzgerald
Osama Bin Laden Dead | The White House
Osama Bin Laden Dead, Obama Announces
Obama: Bin Laden's death makes the world safer - Yahoo! News
Osama bin Laden Killed by U.S. Forces in Pakistan - ABC News
The author is simply and completely wrong about the entire matter.
According to the Greek Scriptures is there a chosen nation today that is appointed by God to give divine punishment?
(Acts 10:34-35)
“For a certainty I perceive that God is not partial, but in every nation the man that fears him and works righteousness is acceptable to him.
I think we all can agree that OBL did many bad things... But did not the Apostle Paul also kill and persecute the Christians...? Why was Paul forgiven...?
(1 Timothy 1:13)
Nevertheless, I was shown mercy, because I was ignorant and acted with a lack of faith.
So it seems the heart condition along with the knowledge is more important that the serious/magnitude of the crime regarding forgiveness...
Does OBL qualify as the apostle Paul did? No human can say for sure...
For if we are going to judge one by number of civilians murdered we should look at both sides of the fence:
Number of CIVILIANS killed from 9/11 attacks : 2973
Number of BRITISH CIVILIANS killed in terrorist attacks: 52
Number of US MILITARY killed in Iraq: 3545
Number of CIVILIANS killed in Iraq War : 250,000
Number of CIVILIANS killed in Afghanistan by coalition forces: 35,000
3,000 civilians MURDERED VS 285,000 civilians MURDERED
Is World Unity Possible?
http://www.watchtower.org/e/20071201/article_02.htm
"That Osama bin Laden is dead does not make the world a better place. It does not make us safer. It does not somehow magically remove a quotient of evil from the face of the earth. Russell Arben Fox, writing on the religious and moral implications of bin Laden's death for Front Porch Republic says it well, "The moral plane of the universe is not somehow improved by the killing of a man...Death begets more death. Killing creates more killers. True, bin Laden will never again mastermind a plan to kill anyone, but someone else will. Someone else just did in the time it took to write that last sentence. And again. And again."
- has absolutely nothing to do with justice or establishing justice in any sense of the word.
He should, firstly, take another read of Romans 13, understanding that God works his purposes - among which are justice - through governments who "do not bear the sword in vain." If one is going to universalize "All who draw the sword die by the sword", then the author is going to find himself in the unfortunate position of telling God that what he gave Paul to write on the purpose of governments is incorrect.
I use this verse only as an example, but I could go on quoting all day. God requires that Man seek out justice and carry out. I am sure you mean well but your position isn't backed up by scripture or reason.
I was glad to hear this man was dead, of course, like most people on earth. I'm not proud of feeling that way, though.
Matthew 10:34. "Do not think that I came to bring peace on earth. I did not come to bring peace but a sword.
35 "For I have come to 'set a man against his father, a daughter against her mother, and a daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law';
36 "and 'a man's enemies will be those of his own household.'
This is such theological and logical mess. Who is this guy?
Has anyone ever displayed more hubris than when this guy tell's us what Jesus "would have" done?
The assertion that if *we* could do X then Jesus certainly would have done X, is muddle-headed at best.
Understand Osama's killing as justice if you want. Or understand it as a supremely reasonable effort to minimize future deaths of innocents. If you can't come to those terms with it then your chosen values are so misaligned with What Is, as to be in immediate need of revision.
And what about the kids in Sodom? And Gomorrah? Even Lot's wife was killed for just sneaking a peak. Is that God's justice?
And what about Christian claims that if I don't accept Christ as my savior, I am going to spend eternity in hell.
God's justice, as you call it, is not only replete with killing, but with fates even worse than death.
Here's how Jesus himself puts it when talking about his second coming:
"Likewise as it was in the days of Lot—they ate, they drank, they bought, they sold, they planted, they built, but on the day when Lot went out from Sodom fire and sulphur rained from heaven and destroyed them all—so will it be on the day when the Son of man is revealed."