Christian philosopher Arthur Holmes said, "To call war anything less than evil would be self-deception. The Christian conscience has throughout history recognized the tragic character of war. The issue that tears the Christian conscience is not whether war is good, but whether it is in all cases avoidable."
We might all perceive the beauty of a sunset — breathtaking in its view, spring rain with its vivid rainbow; chirping birds and baby chicks or the mothering of an infant — the cycle of life; consider, however, nature in its most awful element — the strange foreboding in the violence of an earthquake, the cruelty of a drought or flood, the ravaging of a storm or the menacing ferocity of a wild animal. A certain brutality exists within nature, inextricably combined with its beauty. The God of this splendour is also the God of that violence.
God's masculine aspect of aggression and power lives with God's femine aspect of nurture and human warmth — two sides, one coin. The feminine, the Provider of Life, does her sacred duty with earthy honour. She gives birth in pain, fearing all that might destroy and take this life. The masculine defends, providing a place for succour which, the as Sustainer of Life, he jealously guards. In the neutering of one we leave impotent the other. The divine, in an expression of love, gives birth to Christ. In our emasculation of Christ we render him strangely feminine and incapable of provoking anyone to crucify him.
In the feminine we find a pagan heart – her soul is of the earth. The ‘dust’ of life is carried in her womb. God protects this life, as it is the holder of his image and breath. To worship this image or form is idolatrous, an empty ritual and not the truth. The presence of ‘God’ is within the Torah and in Christ – the same today as yesterday. The idolatry is such that Jesus’ words seem no longer to relate to Moses, who also said (Lev. 19:18), “Do not seek revenge or bear a grudge against one of your people, but love your neighbor as yourself.” Yet Moses killed in order to protect ‘God’s people,’ and Jesus stated that he had not come to bring peace. Our modern scam is not in the preaching of peace but in confusing peacemaking with a fearful pacifism (that is feminized without any leavening of the masculine — devoid of androgyny as it is of truth).
So the argument remains as to whether this current conflict was avoidable. In understanding the ‘nature of the beast’ we uncover the truth. We find the intent, the pretence and the cruelty of the deceiver. In him we see the nature of a predator who will devour if not devoured. The role of the ‘protector’ is in the removal of such an offence; the task is to destroy (masculine) but also to build, create and regenerate (feminine) – one cannot occur without the other.
Swords can again be beaten into ploughshares. Technologies used for weapons of mass destruction may well become our servant in mass construction. “There is a time and place for all to occur under the sun” - a time will surely approach when hearts and minds will conquer a world for peace. The violence we suffer may continue to ebb and to flow but will surely give rise to a peace passing all understanding. The aggression of the masculine may well be subdued into the pacifism of the feminine and perhaps give rise to the true nature of God — a world without violence.
