Christian Anarchism: An Alternative Reality

The Hebrew Scriptures

Christian Anarchist writers have struggled to find a place for the Hebrew Scriptures in their theology. The 'Old Testament' has usually been seen as just that - an outdated mode of understanding - a pre-Christian, sub-Christian work featuring a vengeful, nationalistic God and a divinely appointed monarchy. Tolstoy takes a Marcionist view on such matters, dismissing the value of the Hebrew Scriptures altogether: “The man who believes in the inspiration of the Old Testament... and... atrocities of which the Old Testament is full, cannot believe in the holy love of Christ.”¹ Only more careful scholars have recognised the rebellious voices of the Hebrew Scriptures. Jacques Ellul includes a section on the Hebrew Scriptures in Anarchy and Christianity.² Annie Heppenstall provides an excellent online essay Anarchy and the Old Testament³, and Christian Anarchist priest Daniel Berrigan offers a poetic commentary in The Kings and Their Gods: The Pathology of Power⁴.

The politics of the Hebrew Scriptures is in no way inconsistent with Christian Anarchism. Rather than avoiding this material, Christian Anarchists should continue to develop their understanding of the Hebrew Scriptures as a work that is essentially opposed to political power, and presents an alternative politics for the transformation of the world.

Genesis: An Alternative Reality

From the opening chapters of Genesis, the Hebrew Scriptures present an alternative view of the world. The creation story is presented in direct contrast to the creation stories of surrounding nations, and is notably lacking a distinct political agenda. In Genesis we do not find the divine hierarchy present in other creation myths ⁵. This hierarchy mimics earthly government showing both the belief that local rulers had divine authority and that the people's understanding of godhood was strongly influenced by the earthly authority that they experienced. For the writers of Genesis, this shows a unique political imagination. There are no rulers, only the authority of the creator-God. Creation myths declared the greatness of particular societies or rules, and were often commissioned on the ascent of a new dynasty⁶ - Genesis does not do this. Significantly, the God of Genesis is not a national god, but creator and sustainer of the whole earth.

The Enuma Elish celebrates the primacy of the city of Babylon by giving Babylon's local god Marduk a significant role in the story of creation.⁷ In Genesis, the city plays no role in the creation story. When the concept of the city does arrive it is not associated with greatness, but sinfulness: Cain's jealousy⁸ leads to the first murder⁹ and then the building of the first city¹⁰. Five generations later, Cain's descendant Lamech declares: “If Cain is avenged seven times, then Lamech seventy-seven times.”¹¹ In Genesis, the development of human society into cities and structures goes hand in hand with the escalation of violence and sinfulness. This has huge resonances with anarchist thinking about the inevitability of structural violence.¹² The Hebrew Scriptures have in common with many forms of anarchism¹³ what Ched Myers calls an “urban antipathy.”¹⁴ There is an ever-present romantic rural nostalgia – a desire for a 'return' to a simpler life at one with nature, free from the complexities of urban existence¹⁵.

The sinfulness of the city and the hope of an alternative is seen again in the comparison of the Babel story with the call of Abram. Genesis offers a scathing critique of the most developed civilisation of the time. Babylon's symbol of power was the temple of Marduk, a three-hundred-foot ziggurat known as esagil – 'the house with the uplifted head', and etemenanki – 'the temple of the foundations of heaven and earth'. The Genesis story of Babel satirises the Babylonian myth- the tower is not the work of the gods, but the arrogance of men seeking their own greatness, seeking to reach the heights of heaven for themselves. There is resonance with slavery in Egypt and exile in Babylon – the hearers of the story would have known the human cost of projects like this. The word play makes the point sharply – Babylon is not a 'gate of the gods', it is Babel- confusion. The building of empires is synonymous with sin. Like the anarchists, voices throughout the Hebrew scriptures view imperial projects as necessarily evil and oppressive.

Claiborne and Haw write: “It is no coincidence that what is written immediately after the scattering at Babel is the calling of Abram and Sarai (Genesis 12). Homeless, small, and powerless, they were the antithesis of the Babel project.”¹⁶ Abram is called out to begin a journey that will result in a unique expression of civilisation. Even before Exodus, the theme of being 'called out' in order to create alternative community emerges.¹⁷

1Leo Tolstoy. The Kingdom of God is Within You. Translated by Constance Garnet. Kansas: Digireads, 2005. Pg. 43

2Jacques Ellul. Anarchy and Christianity. Translated by Geoffrey W. Bromiley. Grand Rapids, Michigan: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 1988.

3Heppenstall, Annie. Anarchy and the Old Testament. June 2006 http://compassionistas.net/index.php/component/remository/articles/Anarchy-and-The-Old-Testament/

(accessed 03/09/12)

4Daniel Berrigan, The Kings and Their Gods: The Pathology of Power. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2008.

5Enuma Elish, Epic of Atrahasis, Epic of Gilgamesh, Enki and Ninhursag.

6This is most evident in the progressing Egyptian theologies.

7Marduk takes on roles that were fulfilled by Ea in earlier Sumerian versions of the story.

8Genesis 4:5

9Genesis 4:8

10Genesis 4:17

11Genesis 4:24 (NIV)

12See Johan Galtung. “Violence, Peace and Peace Research,” Journal of Peace Research vol. 6, no. 3 Pg. 167-191

13For example, green anarchism, anarcho-primitivism, and Christian Anarchist communities attempting to 'live off the land'.

14Ched Myers. “Anarcho-primitivism and the Bible”. Originally published in the Encyclopedia of Religion and Nature. Continuum, 2005.
http://www.chedmyers.org/system/files/The%20Fall%20-%20Anarcho%20Primitivism%20%2526%20the%20Bible.pdf

(accessed 11/09/12)

15The wilderness experiences of characters in the Hebrew Scriptures can be seen as a prophetic acting out of the reversal of the fall and a return to Eden.

16Shane Claiborne and Chris Haw. Jesus for President: Politics for Ordinary Radicals.

Grand Rapids, Michigan: Zondervan, 2008. Pg. 31

17Interestingly, the Joseph narrative seems at odds with an anarchist reading. His small, rural, family life leads to conflict and he, and the whole land, are saved by a governmental level of organisation. It is an important reminder that the theme of God's providence is often more prevalent in the Hebrew Scriptures than the theme of God's plan. As we are reminded by the kingship accounts, God's use of a system does not amount to God's approval of it.