Tertullian, Treatise
on the Crown:
“Shall it be held lawful to make an occupation of
the sword, when the Lord proclaims that he
who uses the sword shall perish by the sword? And shall the son of peace
take part in the battle when it does not become him even to sue at law? Shall
he carry a flag, too, hostile to Christ? Is the laurel of the triumph made of leaves, or of corpses? Is it adorned with ribbons, or with tombs? Is
it [sprinkled] with ointments, or with
the tears of wives & mothers? It
may be of some Christians too; for Christ is also among the
barbarians…On the contrary, if a soldier
is converted he must abandon the military immediately.”
Tertullian, The
Shows (Spectacles) 2:
“There’s a vast difference between the corrupted
state & that of primal purity, just because there’s a vast difference
between the Creator & the corrupter. Why, all sorts of evils, which as
indubitably evils even the heathens prohibit, & against which they guard
themselves, come from the works of God. Take, for instance, murder, whether
committed by iron, by poison, or by magical enchantments. Iron and herbs &
demons are all equally creatures of God. Has the Creator, withal, provided
these things for man’s destruction? Nay, God
forbids every sort of man-killing by that one summary precept, ‘Thou shalt not kill.’”
Tertullian, On
Idolatry 19:
“But now inquiry is being made concerning these
issues. First, can any believer enlist in the military? Second, can any
soldier, even those of the rank and file or lesser grades who neither engage in
pagan sacrifices nor capital punishment, be admitted into the church? No on both counts—for there’s no
agreement between the divine sacrament & the human sacrament, the standard
of Christ & the standard of the devil, the camp of light & the camp of
darkness. One soul cannot serve two
masters—God & Caesar. And yet some people toy with the subject by
saying, ‘Moses carried a rod, Aaron wore
a buckle, John the Baptist girded himself with leather just like soldiers do
belts, and Joshua the son of Nun led troops into battle, such that the people
waged war." But how will a Christian engage in war—indeed, how will a Christian even engage in
military service during peacetime—without
the sword, which the Lord has taken away? For although soldiers had
approached John to receive instructions and a centurion believed, this does not
change the fact that afterward, the
Lord, by disarming Peter, disarmed every soldier.’”
Tatian, 185AD:
“I do not wish to be a ruler. I do not strive for
wealth. I refuse offices of military
command…I do not fight for a victor’s laurels. I am free from the mad
thirst for fame. I despise death.”[1]
Irenaeus, Against
Heresies, Book 4, Ch. 34.4:
“No new covenant was given, but they [the Jews] used
the Mosaic law until the coming of the Lord; but from the Lord's advent, the new covenant which brings back peace,
and the law which gives life, has gone forth over the whole earth [Isaiah 2:3-4; Micah 4:2-3]. If
therefore another law & word, going forth from Jerusalem, brought in such a
[reign of] peace among the Gentiles which received it (the word), and
convinced, through them, many a nation of its folly…[Gentiles changed] the
swords and war-lances into ploughshares, & changed them into pruning-hooks
for reaping the grain, [that is], into instruments used for peaceful purposes,
and that they are now unaccustomed to
fighting, but when smitten, offer also the other cheek [Matthew 5:39].”
Clement, Exhortation
to the Heathen (Chapter 11):
“This is the proclamation of righteousness: to
those that obey, glad tidings; to those that disobey, judgment. The loud
trumpet, when sounded, collects the soldiers, & proclaims war. And shall
not Christ, breathing a strain of peace
to the ends of the earth, gather together His own soldiers, the soldiers of
peace? …The trumpet of Christ is His Gospel. He hath blown it, & we have
heard [Eph. 6.10-18].”
Justin Martyr, First
Apology 39:
“We, who
used to kill one another, do not make war on our enemies. We refuse to tell
lies or deceive our inquisitors; we prefer to die acknowledging Christ.”
Cyrpian Letter
56.2:
“The soldiers of Christ are now watching, and stand
sober and armed for the battle; that they cannot be conquered, but that they
can die; and that by this very fact they are invincible, that they do not fear
death; that they do not in turn assail their assailants, since it is not lawful for the innocent even to
kill the guilty; but that they readily deliver up both their lives and their
blood; that since such malice and cruelty rages in the world, they may the
more quickly withdraw from the evil and cruel.”
Hippolytus, Apostolic
Tradition:
“A soldier,
being inferior in rank to God, must not
kill anyone. If ordered to, he must not carry out the order, nor may he
take an oath (sacramentum) to do so.
If he does not accept this, let him be dismissed from the church.”
“Anyone
bearing the power of the sword, or any city magistrate, who wears purple, let him cease from wearing it at once or
be dismissed from the church.”
“Any catechumen or believer who wishes to become a soldier must be dismissed from the church
because they have despised God.”
Athenagoras, A
Plea for Christians 35:
“What man of sound mind, therefore, will affirm,
while such is our character, that we are murderers? [Non-believers know] that we cannot endure even to see a man put to
death, though justly…But we, deeming that to see a man put to death is much the same as killing him, have
abjured such spectacles. How, then, when
we do not even look on, lest we should contract guilt and pollution, can we put
people to death? And when we say that those
women who use drugs to bring on abortion commit murder, and will have to
give an account to God for the abortion, on what principle should we commit
murder? For it does not belong to the same person to regard the very fœtus in
the womb as a created being, and therefore an object of God's care, and when it
has passed into life, to kill it.”
The Martyrdom
of Maximilian (via beheading), 295AD:
“I will not take the badge [of the Roman state]. If
you insist, I will deface it. I am a Christian & I’m not allowed to wear
that leaden seal around my neck. For I already carry the sacred sign of the
Christ, the Son of the living God…It is he whom all we Christians serve, it is
he whom we follow, for he is the lord of life, the author of our salvation.”
The proconsul Dion replied, “There are Christian
soldiers serving our rulers Diocletian & Maximilian, Constantius &
Galerius.”
Maximilian, “That
is their business. I also am a Christian & I cannot serve.”[2]
Sulpicius Severus, On the Life of St. Martin 4:
“Hitherto I have served you as a soldier: allow me
now to become a soldier to God: let the man who is to serve you receive your
donative: I am the soldier of Christ: it
is not lawful for me to fight…If this conduct of mine is ascribed to
cowardice, and not to faith, I will take my stand unarmed before the line of
battle tomorrow, and in the name of the Lord Jesus, protected by the sign of
the cross, and not by shield or helmet, I will safely penetrate the ranks of
the enemy.”
…It was granted him that he should not be sent
unarmed to the fight. And although the good Lord could have preserved his own
soldier, even amid the swords and darts of the enemy, yet that his blessed eyes
might not be pained by witnessing the death of others, he removed all necessity for fighting. For Christ did not require
to secure any other victory in behalf of his own soldier, than that, the enemy
being subdued without bloodshed, no one should suffer death.”
Marcellus the Centurion martyred 298 AD:
“While the objection to sacrifice thus appears as
the main ground for the bold step Marcellus took, it is clear that he was also
exercised over the nature of military service as such: for his last words to
the judge were: “I threw down (my arms); for it was not seemly that a Christian man, who renders military service to
the Lord Christ, should render it (also) by (inflicting) earthly injuries.’”[3]
Origen, Against
Celsus 3.7
“If a [rebellion] had led to the formation of the
Christian commonwealth, so that it derived its existence in this way from that
of the Jews, who were permitted to take
up arms in defense of the members of their families, and to slay their enemies,
[Jesus] would not have altogether forbidden the putting of men to death; and
yet He nowhere teaches that it is right
for His own disciples to offer violence to any one, however wicked. For He
did not deem it in keeping with such laws as His, which were derived from a
divine source, to allow the killing of any individual whatever. Nor would the Christians, had they owed
their origin to a rebellion, have adopted laws of so exceedingly mild a
character as not to allow them, when it was their fate to be slain as
sheep, on any occasion to resist their persecutors.”
5.33:
“And to those who inquire of us whence we come, or
who is our founder, we reply that we have come, agreeably to the counsels of
Jesus, to “cut down our hostile and insolent ‘wordy’ swords into ploughshares,
and to convert into pruning-hooks the
spears formerly employed in war.” For we
no longer take up “sword against nation,” nor do we “learn war anymore,” having
become children of peace, for the sake of Jesus, who is our leader, instead of
those whom our fathers followed [the Jews], among whom we were “strangers
to the covenant,” and having received a law [the Jews].”
8.73
And to those enemies of our faith who require us to
bear arms for the commonwealth, and to slay men, we can reply: “Do
not those who are priests at certain shrines, and those who attend on certain
gods, as you account them, keep their hands free from blood, that
they may with hands unstained and free from human blood offer the appointed
sacrifices to your gods; and even when war is upon you, you never enlist the
priests in the army. If that, then, is a laudable custom, how much more so,
that while others are engaged in battle, these too should engage as the priests
and ministers of God, keeping their hands pure, and wrestling in prayers to God
on behalf of those who are fighting in a righteous cause, and for the king who
reigns righteously, that whatever is opposed to those who act righteously may
be destroyed!” And as we by our prayers vanquish all demons who stir up
war, and lead to the violation of oaths, and disturb the peace, we in this way
are much more helpful to the kings than those who go into the field to fight
for them…And none fight better for the king than we do. We do not indeed fight
under him, although he require it; but we fight on his behalf, forming a
special army— an army of piety— by offering our prayers to God.
Letter
[Epistle] of Pope Nicolas 1, 6:613, 861AD:
“The
soldiers of the world are distinct from the soldiers for the church. Hence,
it is improper for the soldiers of the church to fight for the affairs of the
world, which involves them inevitably in
the spilling of blood. Just as it is wrong for a layman to interfere with
spiritual affairs, so it is ridiculous
& inappropriate for a cleric to take up arms & go to war.”
