This article maps out a theology of nonviolence in three parts so that our conclusions are situated within the larger story of God attested in the Bible: First, I’m going to outline God’s vision for humanity as developed through some key Scriptures. Second, I’ll explain how Jesus is presented in the New Testament as the true Human Being who therefore makes it possible for all humanity to ultimately attain the fullness of God’s vision for humanity. Finally, I want to suggest that a crucial aspect of living into this vision is a renunciation of all violence on account of the kind of life we are called to embody in union with Jesus.
The Human Calling: Created In the Image of God
In order to properly frame the issue of nonviolence, we need to first answer the question: What does it mean to be human?
The most essential and distinctive feature of humans according to the Scriptures--and we learn this at the very beginning of the Bible--is that what it means to be human is to be made in the image of God (Gen. 1:26-28). But it is important to notice that Genesis does not say that humans are the image of God. Humans are only said to be created “in” the image of God and made “according to” his likeness (Gen. 1:26). It’s common to pass over the prepositions “in” and “according to,” but overlooking these prepositions leads to a grave mistake: the idea that humans are the image of God. The Scriptures are clear that humans are not God’s image or likeness, but rather something or someone else is. What the New Testament says is that we are to “conform” to God’s image (Eph. 4:23-24, Col. 3:10; Rom. 8:29, 1 Cor. 15:49; 2 Cor. 3:18, Gal. 4:19).
Being made in and according to God’s image confers a particular destiny or calling upon humanity. God made humanity capable of union with him—able to unite in such a way that we become conformed to God’s likeness. To illustrate: a glove is made in the image of a hand; it’s made according to its likeness in order to “fit” with a hand. To unite with it. To conform to it. Being made in God’s image and according to his likeness means being able to unite with God, to be conformed to God’s image. Moreover, our union with God—our becoming like God in God’s character—is necessary for carrying out our God-given vocation to rule and serve all creation faithfully in a godly fashion (Gen. 1:26, 28; 2:15; Ps. 8:6–8).
Our union with God—our becoming like God in God’s character—is necessary for carrying out our God-given vocation to rule and serve all creation faithfully in a godly fashion (Gen. 1:26, 28; 2:15; Ps. 8:6–8).
Our union with God - our becoming like God in God's character - is necessary for carrying out our God-given vocation to rule and serve all creation faithfully in a godly fashion (Gen. 1:26, 28; 2:15; Ps. 8:6-8). Psalm 8 celebrates this image-of-God-calling by saying that humanity is crowned with God’s “glory” and “honor” (Ps. 8:5). However, Paul says that all humanity “falls short of the glory of God” (Rom. 3:23). Sin has hamstrung humanity’s ability to conform to God’s glorious image. This is why Paul then says the solution (i.e., salvation) from falling short of the glory of God is glorification, which he says is conformity to the image of God (8:17–18, 21, 29-30). Thus, picking up on the themes in Psalm 8, Paul frames salvation as God bringing about humanity’s conformity to the glorious divine image so that all creation is glorified (8:17-25, 29-30).
But, we still haven’t said who or what the image is.
Jesus: The Image of God
Paul comes right out and says, “Jesus is the image of the invisible God” (Col. 1:15; 2 Cor. 4:4), and Jesus is “the glory of God” (2 Cor 4:6). Since Jesus is the image and glory of God, this means he is the Human Being par excellence. Jesus is the image and likeness according to which the rest of humanity is to be patterned after. This is why many of the passages in Scripture about conforming to the divine image are actually about conforming to the image of Jesus (Rom. 8:29, 1 Cor. 15:49; 2 Cor. 3:18, Gal. 4:19, Eph. 4:23-24, Col. 3:10).
This is also why New Testament authors make explicit that Psalm 8, a Psalm praising God for what it means to be human, is fulfilled in Jesus, the genuine human being who, through his death and resurrection, has “all things put under His feet” as Psalm 8:5 says (Eph. 1:22; cf. 1 Cor. 15:25, 27; Phil. 3:21; Heb. 2:8). Amazingly, Paul says that just as Jesus has been “raised” and “seated” with God with everything being brought under his feet (Eph. 1:20-23; cf. Ps. 8:5), Christians are likewise “raised” and “seated” “together with him” (2:4-7; cf. Rom. 8:35 ff.). In other words, by uniting us to himself, Jesus makes humanity capable of fulfilling their calling to be conformed to the image of God for the sake of all creation as sung in Psalm 8.
Cruciformity: Conforming to the Cross-Shaped Image of Jesus
Having faith in Jesus means believing that Jesus knows best how to live a truly human life and that he actually lived that truly human life. To be a follower of Jesus is to learn to be like him and live like him by following the example he sets before us. We must learn from Jesus how humans are to rule and serve creation faithfully (Gen. 1:26-28; Ps. 8) because Jesus supremely reveals to us how we are to relate to creation, including fellow human creatures, in a truly human way. Looking to Jesus allows us to discover which ways of relating to creation are genuinely human and worthy of glory and which ways are dehumanizing and worthy of death.
Importantly, in their own ways, various New Testament authors reaffirm Paul’s startling comments that conforming to Jesus’ likeness means being co-crucified with him (Rom. 6:5-6; Gal. 2:20). Paul says the crucifixion revealed God’s reconciling love towards his enemies who were helpless, ungodly, and sinful (Rom. 5:6-11). Therefore, to be conformed to the image of Christ means becoming the kind of person who dies for one’s enemies, since this is specifically what the crucifixion of Jesus was all about. Peter says that what is exemplary about Christ is specifically his crucifixion and how it teaches us to relate to others, especially enemies (1 Pet. 2:21-24; cf. 2:23 and 4:19). John says that those who claim to abide in Jesus “ought to walk just as he walked” (1 Jn. 2:6). And how did Jesus walk? He loved his enemies to the point of death and forgave them (see Lk. 23:34). This is why John goes on to express how Jesus’ death sets the pattern for how we are supposed to live lovingly and hospitably towards others (1 Jn. 3:16-17). This passage is highly significant. It shows how the cross isn’t simply about being ready to die if someone wants to kill you (to put it bluntly). Rather, the cross is about a certain pattern of life—a cross-shaped way of being in the world. It’s about the kinds of sacrifices and practices that make a life of genuine love of neighbor and enemy possible. Conformity to the image of God--Christ Crucified--is therefore cruciformity (“cross-shaped” = patterned after the crucifixion).
Thus, the cross wasn’t only the place where sins were forgiven; it is the very kind of life all his followers are called to live (Mar. 8:34-38; 1 Pet. 2:21-25; 3:9; 2 Cor. 4:7-12). We are called to follow Jesus to the cross and thereby witness to God’s rule, healing, justice, and life to the oppressed, battered, unjust, and dying world.
Having faith in Jesus means believing that Jesus knows best how to live a truly human life and that he actually lived that truly human life. Paul can hardly make it any more clear that to know Jesus, to have a personal relationship with him, means to be conformed to Jesus’ death (Phil. 3:10). Jesus’ death was the result of being “obedient” (2:8) to unconditional enemy-embracing and reconciling love even when—perhaps, especially when—it was not reciprocated. Paul instructs: “Let the same mind be in you that was in Christ Jesus” (2:5). Paul immediately goes on to show from the gospel story that the mind of Christ is self-emptying and self-humbling obedient service for others even to the point of death (2:6-8).
Remember, Jesus had in “mind” (2:8) to die for and at the hands of the “weak,” the “ungodly,” the “sinners,” and his “enemies” (Rom. 5:6-11). What this means is all really quite simple, but the scandal of its simplicity has provoked all sorts of excuses to come forth from self-professing Jesus followers. Here it is: If we don’t have that kind of humble love in mind—to die for and at the hands of our enemies—then we don’t have the same mind of Christ! To reject this mind is to reject the way of the cross that Jesus requires all disciples to take up (Mar. 8:34-35). It is to reject a life “worthy of the gospel of Christ” (Phil. 1:27).
Having the mind of Christ means embracing others, especially our enemies, in humble, reconciling, and forgiving love. It means never giving up on them even when they are putting us to death (“Father, forgive them; for they do not know what they are doing.”—Lk. 23:34; cf. Acts 7:60). Paul knows that in order to do this we need to be developing the virtue of humility together now (Phil. 2:3-4, 8), so that we are prepared when such encounters arise. A worldly and dehumanizing mind means just the opposite: to violently grasp for our own interests and security, ignoring “the interests of others” (2:4, 6).
We can also think of it this way: since picking up a Roman cross was the way Jesus brought resurrection-Life to the world and calls us to join with him, then this means that picking up swords leads to death. We blaspheme the cross of Christ as too weak and insufficient to deal with the evil and injustice of the world when we pursue other means (such as violence). But, more profoundly, rejecting the way of the cross is rejecting the human calling to unite with and conform to the image of God as it is supremely revealed in Jesus and especially in his death (2 Cor. 4:4, 10; Phil. 3:10). To reject this way is to reject genuine human-ness and embrace dehumanization. That necessarily leads to death because it rejects the way of life God has revealed in Jesus. But here’s the kicker: the ultimate paradox is that the way of Jesus—the way of the cross—is to bear the death of those who embrace dehumanization (these are the ultimate enemies of God and creation), waiting upon God alone to bring Life and Blessing where there is Death and Curse (1 Pet. 2:21-24; 3:17-18; 4:19).
No wonder Paul says that the “message about the cross” is “foolishness” and a “scandal” (1 Cor. 1:18, 23). Being a Christian is tantamount to being co-crucified with Christ by enemies (Rom. 6:6; Gal. 2:20)! Jesus said to count the cost of being his disciple and the cost is great. Indeed, the cost is the cross (Lk. 14:27-28), and the cross is what happens when humble love is despised and rejected and yet continues to love. So the cost is great to be sure, but we are promised that the reward is even greater (see Phil. 2:9-11 and Eph. 2:5-6).
A Warning: Christian Nonviolence Can Be Abused
Given how easily cruciform nonviolence can be misunderstood and abused, it behooves me to denounce wielding cruciformity as a weapon of oppression. “No demand has been more completely misused,” as Howard Thurman observed, than the injunction to love one’s enemies and “absorb violence directed against them.” This is because the motif of sharing in Christ’s suffering is often invoked to reinforce the status quo of oppression. As Thurman says, it “has many times been used by the exploiters of the weak to keep them submissive and subservient” ("Good News for the Underprivileged,” Religion in Life 4, 408). If rejecting cruciform nonviolence means to reject the way of Jesus, then those who wield cruciformity as a weapon have blasphemed the cross of Christ all the more. Jesus’ suffering, among other things, is the divine challenge to the upending of all systems of domination. Thus, those who seek to reinforce these oppressive systems and individual abuses are engaging in anti-Christ actions; i.e., trying to reinforce and preserve what the cross of Christ is condemning and destroying. The cross is about a certain pattern of life—a cross-shaped way of being in the world. It’s about the kinds of sacrifices and practices that make a life of genuine love of neighbor and enemy possible. Conformity to the image of God--Christ Crucified--is therefore cruciformity.
The call to cruciform nonviolence is also not a call to passivity in the face of violence, oppression, or any manner of evil and injustice. It is first a call to active peace-making (“pacifism” actually means “to pacify,” “to make peace”). But this entails actively fighting against evil and injustice. For Christians, this has to take place in a Christ-like (cruciform) manner in order to not lose one’s humanity by being conformed into the image of oppressors rather than to Christ Crucified (1 Cor. 2:2). Counting the cost of the cross is about recognizing that telling the truth to those in power can cost us our lives. It means telling wolves that they are acting like wolves and calling them to repent and invite them to be sheep under the Good Shepherd. But the deep truth of the matter that Jesus wants us all to reckon with is that when we engage in this witness, many of these wolves react beastly and get drunk off our blood (Rev. 16:6; 17:6; 18:24).
Jesus and Paul advise everyone to flee situations of active oppression if possible. So no one should interpret cruciformity as being the proverbial “doormat.” In fact, Jesus himself often escaped hostile situations (Jn. 8:59; 10:31, 39; Lk. 4:28-30) until he was convinced his “hour” had come (Jn. 12:23, 27). Jesus also tells those in Jerusalem to “flee to the mountains” rather than fight the Romans to save the city (Mar. 13). Paul was humiliatingly lowered from a basket down a city wall to escape persecution (2 Cor. 11:32-33; Acts 9:23-25). Paul tells slaves to seek freedom if they could (a little more of a viable possibility for certain forms of Roman slavery) (1 Cor. 7:21). Many disciples fled Jerusalem after a persecution broke out when Stephen was murdered (Acts 8:1-3) and fleeing is not only not looked down upon, but God uses it to spread the gospel to the areas they fled to (8:4ff.).
So, if you’re reading this and you’re in an abusive situation, do everything in your power to flee. Jesus is not calling you to passively accept abuse or violence. Cruciformity in this situation is about not allowing our own humanity to be corrupted by the violence inflicted upon us. But that doesn’t require us to remain in abusive situations, so far as it depends on us.
Conclusion
It is thus my contention that nonviolence isn’t so much an ethic or a principle that gets “applied” in a so-called ethical dilemma. Rather, it’s simply a way to name what sorts of actions are necessarily dehumanizing for the divine calling of humanity. Violence orients one further away from a life patterned after and conformed to the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus of Nazareth, the revealer of humanity’s destiny. Violence is dehumanizing by definition since, for Christians, the cruciform character of Christ defines what “human” means. Make no mistake, though. We are called to fight and resist every manner of evil and injustice we encounter in this chaotic and wicked world. But what I have shown from the Scriptures is that we are called to engage this fight in a Christ-like, cruciform, and therefore nonviolent way.
Many misunderstand Jesus’s teachings as if he is laying out some instructions for a utopia. Love my enemies? Give to those who ask? Let my yes be yes? Forgive 70 x 7 times? Maybe in a “perfect world.” But Jesus’ so-called “moral” teachings were never meant for a “perfect world”—they are precisely for this very imperfect world. It is precisely in a world always at war that Jesus says his followers can only imagine being nonviolent. Since picking up a Roman cross was the way Jesus brought resurrection-Life to the world and calls us to join with him, then this means that picking up swords leads to death. It is precisely in a world that traffics in revenge and retribution that Jesus says his followers can only imagine being merciful and forgiving. It is precisely in a world of voracious acquisitiveness that Jesus says his followers can only imagine being generous. It is precisely in a world of deceit that legalizes injustice that followers of Jesus can only imagine being truthful and just. It is precisely in a world of domination and despotism that followers of Jesus can only imagine being servants of all. It is precisely in a world ruled by fear of the stranger that children of God can only imagine being hospitable. Jesus practiced what he preached. His life led to the cross because that’s what it looks like when the image of God lives a truly human life among an imperfect world of sinners.
This is what conformity to the cruciform image and glory of God looks like in a violent world. This way of being in the world is simply the way we faithfully witness to the peaceable and merciful character and rule of God.
