What Does the Bible Say About Gun Control?
by
Larry Pratt
Executive Vice-President
Gun Owners Foundation
The underlying argument for gun control seems to be that the availability of
guns causes crime. By extension, the availability of any weapon would have to
be viewed as a cause of crime. What does the Bible say about such a view?
Perhaps we should start at the beginning, or at least very close to the beginning
-- in Genesis 4. In this chapter we read about the first murder. Cain had offered
an unacceptable sacrifice, and Cain was upset that God insisted that he do the
right thing. In other words, Cain was peeved that he could not do his own thing.
Cain decided to kill his brother rather than get right with God. There were
no guns available, although there may well have been a knife. Whether it was
a knife or a rock, the Bible does not say. The point is, the evil in Cain's
heart was the cause of the murder, not the availability of the murder weapon.
God's response was not to ban rocks or knives, or whatever, but to banish the
murderer. Later (see Genesis 9:5-6) God instituted capital punishment, but said
not a word about banning weapons.
Did Christ Teach Pacifism?
Many people, Christians included, assume that Christ taught pacifism. They cite
Matthew 5:38-39 for their proof. In this verse Christ said: "You have heard
that it was said, 'An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth.' But I tell you
not to resist an evil person. But whoever slaps you on your right cheek, turn
the other to him also."
The Sermon on the Mount from which this passage is taken deals with righteous
personal conduct. In our passage, Christ is clearing up a confusion that had
led people to think that conduct proper for the civil government -- that is,
taking vengeance -- was also proper for an individual.
Even the choice of words used by Christ indicates that He was addressing a confusion,
or a distortion, that was commonplace. Several times in the rest of the Sermon
on the Mount Christ used this same "you have heard it said" figure
of speech to straighten out misunderstandings or falsehoods being taught by
the religious leaders of the times.
Contrast this to Christ's use of the phrase "it is written" when He
was appealing to the Scriptures for authority (for example, see Matthew 4 where
on three occasions during His temptation by the devil, Christ answered each
one of the devil's lies or misquotes from Scripture with the words: "it
is written").
To further underscore the point that Christ was correcting the religious leaders
on their teaching that "an eye for an eye" applies to private revenge,
consider that in the same Sermon, Christ strongly condemned false teaching:
"Whoever therefore breaks one of the commandments, and teaches men so,
shall be called least in the kingdom of heaven..." (Matthew 5:19). Clearly,
then, Christ was not teaching something different about self defense than is
taught elsewhere in the Bible. Otherwise, He would be contradicting Himself
for He would now be teaching men to break one of the commandments.
The reference to "an eye for an eye" was taken from Exodus 21:24-25
which deals with how the magistrate must deal with a crime. Namely, the punishment
must fit the crime. The religious leaders of Christ's day had twisted a passage
that applied to the government and misused it as a principle of personal revenge.
The Bible distinguishes clearly between the duties of the civil magistrate (the
government) and the duties of an individual. Namely, God has delegated to the
civil magistrate the administration of justice. Individuals have the responsibility
of protecting their lives from attackers. Christ was referring to this distinction
in the Matthew 5 passage. Let us now examine in some detail what the Scriptures
say about the roles of government and of individuals.
Both the Old and New Testaments teach individual self defense, even if it means
taking the assailant's life in certain circumstances.
Self-Defense in the Old Testament
Exodus 22:2-3 tells us "If the thief is found breaking in, and he is struck
so that he dies, there shall be no guilt for his bloodshed. If the sun has risen
on him, there shall be guilt for his bloodshed. He should make full restitution;
if he has nothing, then he shall be sold for his theft."
One conclusion which can be drawn from this is that a threat to our life is
to be met with lethal force. During the day, presumably because we can recognize
and later apprehend the thief if he escapes, we are not to kill him in non life-threatening
circumstances.
In Proverbs 25:26 we read that "A righteous man who falters before the
wicked is like a murky spring and a polluted well." Certainly, we would
be faltering before the wicked if we chose to be unarmed and unable to resist
an assailant who might be threatening our life. In other words, we have no right
to hand over our life which is a gift from God to the unrighteous. It is a serious
mistake to equate a civilized society with one in which the decent people are
doormats for the evil to trample on.
Trusting God
Another question asked by Christians is "Doesn't having a gun imply a lack
of trust that God will take care of us?"
Indeed, God will take care of us. He has also told us that if we love Him, we
will keep His commandments. (John 14:15)
Those who trust God work for a living, knowing that 1 Timothy 5:8 tells us "But
if anyone does not provide for his own, and especially for those of his household,
he has denied the faith and is worse than an unbeliever." For a man not
to work, yet expect to eat because he was "trusting God" would actually
be to defy God.
King David wrote in Psalm 46:1 that God is our refuge and strength, a very present
help in trouble. This did not conflict with praising the God "Who trains
my hands for war and my fingers for battle" (Psalm 144:1).
The doctrine of Scripture is that we prepare and work, but we trust the outcome
to God.
Those who trust God should also make adequate provision for their own defense
even as we are instructed in the passages cited above. For a man to refuse to
provide adequately for his and his family's defense would be to defy God.
There is an additional concern to taking the position that "I don't need
to arm myself. God will protect me."
At one point, when Satan was tempting Jesus in the wilderness, he challenged
Jesus to throw himself off the top of the temple. Satan reasoned that God's
angels would protect him. Jesus responded: "It is written again, 'You shall
not tempt the Lord your God'" (Matthew 4:7).
It may seem pious to say that one is trusting in God for protection, and we
all must, but it is tempting God if we do not take the measures that He has
laid out for us in the Bible.
Role of Government
The Bible records the first murder in Genesis 4 when Cain killed his brother
Abel. God's response was not to register rocks or impose a background check
on those getting a plough, or whatever it was that Cain used to kill his brother.
Instead, God dealt with the criminal. Ever since Noah the penalty for murder
has been death.
Nowhere in the Bible does God make any provision for dealing with the instruments
of crime. He always focuses on the consequences for an individual of his actions.
Heaven and hell only applies to people, not to things. Responsibility only pertains
to people, not to things.
Resisting an attack is not to be confused with taking vengeance which is the
exclusive domain of God (Romans 12:19). This has been delegated to the civil
magistrate, who, as we read in Romans 13:4, "is God's minister to you for
good. But if you do evil, be afraid; for he does not bear the sword in vain;
for he is God's minister, an avenger to execute wrath on him who practices evil."
Private vengeance means one would stalk down a criminal after one's life is
no longer in danger as opposed to defending oneself during an attack. It is
this very point that has been confused by Christian pacifists who would take
the passage in the Sermon on the Mount about turning the other cheek (which
prohibits private vengeance) into a command to falter before the wicked.
Let us consider also that the Sixth Commandment tells us "Thou shall not
murder." In the chapters following, God gave to Moses many of the situations
which require a death penalty. God clearly has not told us never to kill. He
has told us not to murder, which means we are not to take an innocent life.
Consider also that the civil magistrate is to be a terror to those who practice
evil. This passage does not in any way imply that the role of law enforcement
is to prevent crimes or to protect individuals from criminals. The magistrate
is a minister to serve as "an avenger to execute wrath on him who practices
evil" (Romans 13:4).
This point is reflected in the legal doctrine of the United States. Repeatedly,
courts have held that the government has no responsibility to provide individual
security. One case (Bowers v. DeVito) put it this way: "there is no constitutional
right to be protected by the state against being murdered."
Self Defense in the New Testament
The Christian pacifist may try to argue that God has changed His mind from the
time that He gave Moses the Ten Commandments on Mount Sinai. Perhaps they would
want us to think that Christ canceled out the Ten Commandments in Exodus 20
or the provision for justifiably killing a thief in Exodus 22. But the writer
of Hebrews makes it clear that this cannot be, because "Jesus Christ is
the same yesterday, today and forever" (Hebrews 13:8). In the Old Testament,
the prophet Malachi records God's words this way: "For I am the Lord, I
do not change" (Malachi 3:6).
Paul was referring to the unchangeability of God's Word when he wrote to Timothy
that "All Scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for
doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness, that
the man of God may be complete, thoroughly equipped for every good work"
(2 Timothy 3:16-17). Clearly, Paul viewed all Scripture, including the Old Testament,
as useful for training Christians in every area of life.
We must also consider what Christ told his disciples in his last hours with
them: "...But now, he who has a money bag, let him take it, and likewise
a sack; and he who has no sword, let him sell his garment and buy one"
(Luke 22:36, emphasis added). Keep in mind that the sword was the finest offensive
weapon available to an individual soldier -- the equivalent then of a military
rifle today.
The Christian pacifist will likely object at this point that only a few hours
later, Christ rebuked Peter who used a sword to cut off the ear of Malchus,
a servant of the high priest in the company of a detachment of troops. Let us
read what Christ said to Peter in Matthew 26:52-54:
Put your sword in its place, for all who take the sword will perish by the sword.
Or do you think that I cannot now pray to My Father, and He will provide Me
with more than twelve legions of angels? How then could the Scriptures be fulfilled,
that it must happen thus?
In the companion passage in John 18, Jesus tells Peter to put his sword away
and told him that He had to drink the cup that His Father had given Him.
It was not the first time that Christ had to explain to the disciples why He
had come to earth. To fulfill the Scriptures, the Son of God had to die for
the sin of man since man was incapable of paying for his own sin apart from
going to hell. Christ could have saved His life, but then believers would have
lost their lives forever in hell. These things only became clear to the disciples
after Christ had died and been raised from the dead and the Spirit had come
into the world at Pentecost (see John 14:26).
While Christ told Peter to "put your sword in its place" He clearly
did not say get rid of it forever. That would have contradicted what he had
told the disciples only hours before. Peter's sword was to protect his own mortal
life from danger. His sword was not needed to protect the Creator of the universe
and the King of kings.
Years after Pentecost, Paul wrote in a letter to Timothy "But if anyone
does not provide for his own, and especially for those of his household, he
has denied the faith and is worse than an unbeliever" (1 Tim. 5:8). This
passage applies to our subject because it would be absurd to buy a house, furnish
it with food and facilities for one's family, and then refuse to install locks
and provide the means to protect the family and the property. Likewise it would
be absurd not to take, if necessary, the life of a night-time thief to protect
the members of the family (Exodus 22:2-3).
A related, and even broader concept, is found in the parable of the Good Samaritan.
Christ had referred to the Old Testament summary of all the laws of the Bible
into two great commandments: "'You shall love the Lord your God with all
your heart, with all your soul, with all your strength, and with all your mind,'
and your neighbor as yourself'" (Luke 10:27). When asked who was a neighbor,
Christ related the parable of the Good Samaritan (Luke 10:30-37). It was the
Good Samaritan who took care of the mugging victim who was a neighbor to the
victim. The others who walked by and ignored the victim's plight were not acting
as neighbors to him.
In the light of all we have seen the Scriptures teach to this point, can we
argue that if we were able to save another's life from an attacker by shooting
the attacker with our gun that we should "turn the other cheek instead?"
The Bible speaks of no such right. It only speaks of our responsibilities in
the face of an attack -- as individual creatures made by God, as householders
or as neighbors.
National Blessings and Cursings
The Old Testament also tells us a great deal about the positive relationship
between righteousness, which exalts a nation, and self defense.
It makes clear that in times of national rebellion against the Lord God, the
rulers of the nation will reflect the spiritual degradation of the people and
the result is a denial of God's commandments, an arrogance of officialdom, disarmament
and oppression.
For example, the people of Israel were oppressed during the time of the rule
of the Judges. This occurred every time the people apostatized. Judges 5:8 tells
us that, "They chose new gods; then there was war in the gates; not a shield
or spear was seen among forty thousand in Israel."
Consider Israel under Saul: The first book of Samuel tells of the turning away
of Israel from God. The people did not want to be governed by God; they wanted
to be ruled by a king like the pagan, God-hating nations around them. Samuel
warned the people what they were getting into -- the curses that would be upon
them -- if they persisted in raising up a king over themselves and their families.
Included in those curses was the raising up of a standing, professional army
which would take their sons and their daughters for aggressive wars (I Samuel
8:11).
This curse is not unknown in the United States. Saul carried out all the judgments
that Samuel had warned the people about. His build up of a standing army has
been repeated in the U.S., and not just in terms of the military, but also the
650,000 full-time police officers from all levels of government.
Saul was the king the Israelites wanted and got. He was beautiful in the eyes
of the world but a disaster in the eyes of the Lord. Saul did not trust God.
He rebelled against His form of sacrifice unto the Lord. Saul put himself above
God. He was impatient. He refused to wait for Samuel because God's way was taking
too long. Saul went ahead and performed the sacrifice himself, thus violating
God's commandment (and, incidentally, also violating the God-ordained separation
of duties of church and state!)
Thus was the kingdom lost to Saul. And, it was under him that the Philistines
were able to defeat the Jews and put them into bondage. So great was the bondage
exerted by the Philistines that "Now there was no blacksmith to be found
throughout all the land of Israel: for the Philistines said, 'Lest the Hebrews
make them swords or spears.' But all the Israelites went down to the Philistines
to sharpen each man's plowshare, his mattock, his ax, and his sickle;...So it
came about, on the day of battle, that there was neither sword nor spear found
in the hand of any of the people who were with Saul and Jonathan..." (1
Samuel 13:19-20; 22-23).
Today, the same goals of the Philistines would be carried out by an oppressor
who would ban gunsmiths from the land. The sword of today is the handgun, rifle
or shotgun. The sword control of the Philistines is today's gun control of those
governments that do not trust their people with guns.
It is important to understand that what happened to the Jews at the time of
Saul was not unexpected according to the sanctions spelled out by God in Leviticus
26 and Deuteronomy 28. In the first verses of those chapters, blessings are
promised to a nation that keeps God's laws. In the latter parts of those chapters,
the curses are spelled out for a nation that comes under judgment for its rebellion
against God. Deuteronomy 28:47-48 helps us understand the reason for Israel's
oppression by the Philistines during Saul's reign:
Because you did not serve the Lord your God with joy and gladness of heart,
for the abundance of all things, therefore you shall serve your enemies, whom
the Lord will send against you, in hunger, in thirst, in nakedness, and in need
of all things; and He will put a yoke of iron on your neck until He has destroyed
you.
The Bible provides examples of God's blessing upon Israel for its faithfulness.
These blessings included a strong national defense coupled with peace. A clear
example occurred during the reign of Jehoshaphat. 2 Chronicles 17 tells of how
Jehoshaphat led Israel back to faithfulness to God which included a strong national
defense. The result: "And the fear of the Lord fell on all the kingdoms
of the lands that were around Judah, so that they did not make war against Jehoshaphat"
(2 Chronicles 17:10).
The Israelite army was a militia army (Numbers 1:3, ff.) which came to battle
with each man bearing his own weapons -- from the time of Moses, through the
Judges, and beyond. When threatened by the Midianites, for example, "Moses
spoke to the people , saying, 'Arm some of yourselves for the war, and let them
go against the Midianites to take vengeance for the Lord on Midian'" (Numbers
31:3). Again, to demonstrate the Biblical heritage of individuals bearing and
keeping arms, during David's time in the wilderness avoiding capture by Saul,
"David said to his men, 'Every man gird on his sword.' So every man girded
on his sword, and David also girded on his sword" (1 Samuel 25:13).
Finally, consider Nehemiah and those who rebuilt the gates and walls of Jerusalem.
They were both builders and defenders, each man -- each servant -- armed with
his own weapon:
Those who built on the wall, and those who carried burdens loaded themselves
so that with one hand they worked at construction, and with the other held a
weapon. Every one of the builders had his sword girded at his side as he built
(Nehemiah 4:17-18).
Conclusion
The wisdom of the framers of the Constitution is consistent with the lessons
of the Bible. Instruments of defense should be dispersed throughout the nation,
not concentrated in the hands of the central government. In a godly country,
righteousness governs each man through the Holy Spirit working within. The government
has no cause to want a monopoly of force; the government that desires such a
monopoly is a threat to the lives, liberty and property of its citizens.
The assumption that only danger can result from people carrying guns is used
to justify the government's having a monopoly of force. The notion that the
people cannot be trusted to keep and bear their own arms informs us that ours,
like the time of Solomon, may be one of great riches but is also a time of peril
to free people. If Christ is not our King, we shall have a dictator to rule
over us, just as Samuel warned.
For those who think that God treated Israel differently from the way He will
treat us today, please consider what God told the prophet Malachi: "For
I am the Lord, I do not change..." (Malachi 3:6).