Is war the judgment of God? James Spencer and Ashish Varma take up the second question in Karl Barth’s wartime letter to American Christians, and whether some are more guilty than others.
Barth answers yes, and James argues that judgment is part of how humans, as God’s image, reflect God after the fall. The conversation separates recognizing evil as evil from deciding how to carry out judgment, works through Hosea’s picture of wrath giving way to mercy, and asks why Barth saw World War II as a fight that had to be fought. Restraining evil before it spreads, they suggest, is part of what judgment is for.
Many Christians remember World War II as a clean contest between good and evil. James and Ashish question that framing, and the language of more and less guilt behind it, pointing to Churchill’s policies in India, the Allies’ tolerance of Jim Crow, and the early indifference to Hitler documented at Nuremberg’s Documentation Center. By placing Romans 3:23 beside Romans 13:1–7, Barth leaves no one off the hook while still insisting that evil must be resisted.
In this episode:
- Is war the judgment of God on humankind, and is anyone less guilty?
- Romans 13:1–7 and Romans 3:23 in Karl Barth’s answer
- Judgment and mercy in Hosea, and whether God’s judgment is delayed or suspended
- Why “more guilty” and “less guilty” can excuse the side we favor
- Oliver O’Donovan’s The Ways of Judgment and earthly authorities as “secondary theaters” of God’s judgment
Go deeper: Christians and Politics
Thinking Christian is hosted by Dr. James Spencer, president of the D. L. Moody Center and author of Digital Discernment (InterVarsity Press). Each conversation reads the Bible as the final authority for life and faith, questioning the assumptions of our culture, even our Christian culture, so that we don’t settle for a narrower vision than God’s word offers.
Unsettling convention. Cultivating conviction.
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