The crisis and catharsis of Christian ethics: Non-retaliation as eschatological key to the narrow gate

Theologian Walter Wink popularized the idea that Jesus taught his followers to non-violently resist oppressive authorities by taking socially-unexpected action in the face of injustice. This was typically accomplished by creatively exposing an evildoer to costly public shame. Wink is known particularly for his exposition upon three Dominical commands from the Sermon on the Mount (Matthew 5:39-41):

• By turning the other cheek after receiving an insulting back-handed slap, the Christian—likely a slave or other low status individual—would force the perpetrator to either exacerbate the violence with real blows or acknowledge the wrong done. An escalation as such would mean that the superior man had recognized the parity of the inferior man—only equals engage in brawling.
• By handing over one’s coat to the man who sues for one’s shirt, the Christian—likely a victim of a partial justice system—would impose his nakedness upon all parties. This would dishonor the offender as he would now be responsible for this public nudity.
• By carrying the equipment of a Roman soldier for a second mile after being compelled to go one mile, the Christian would entrap the soldier in a serious military-code infraction. A soldier could legally force a non-citizen to labor for one mile but no further.

Wink’s theory of non-violent resistance has remained an important hermeneutical tool for those seeking to discover some practical utility, as well as some sensible limit, in the most radical directives of Jesus. Despite the sustained cultural currency generated by this type of interpretation, however, nearly every contour of Wink’s proposed contextual landscape is speculative or fanciful.

Do not be afraid of those who destroy your cheek but cannot destroy your soul

Jesus encloses the saying regarding cheek-turning within his repudiation of the lex talionis, “an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth.” Instead of pursuing such recompense, a disciple must “not oppose an evildoer, but rather, if anyone strikes [him] on the right cheek, [he must] turn the other also” (Matthew 5:38-39). While the word ῥαπίζω can mean “slap,” it designates all kinds of strikes as well, whether with an open hand, a closed hand, or a rod of some sort. To strike the cheek, of course, could readily result in the loss of an eye or a tooth (cf. Psalm 3:7). Contra Wink, in the Roman world the powerful maintained a sense of superiority precisely because they could inflict serious damage upon those of lower rank without fear of repercussion. Thus offering up the other cheek to the assailant served to heighten the vulnerability of the victim to permanent bodily harm.

Jewish scripture seemingly concurs with this assessment. In the book of Lamentations the tormented community of Jerusalem remembers that “the Lord is good to those who wait for him… It is good that one should wait quietly for the salvation of the Lord… And to put one’s mouth to the dust… And to give one’s cheek to the smiter… For the Lord will not reject forever.” (Lamentations 3:25-31). The same broken but hopeful people speak in a post-exilic oracle of Isaiah—“I gave my back to those who struck me and my cheeks to those who pulled out [my] beard… The Lord God helps me; therefore I have not been disgraced” (Isaiah 50:6-7). Such willingness to freely endure mistreatment depended not upon the opportunity to shame evildoers in the here and now but upon God’s promises of swift retribution on behalf of his suffering servants. The giving of one’s cheek to evildoers embodied an Israelite’s complete faith in God’s eschatological intentions.

No one can be my disciple unless he gives up all his clothes

Wink is right to situate the scenario envisioned in Matthew 5:40 in a court. The word κριθῆναι does suggest that a legal kind of dispossession is at hand. Yet difficulty arises with the addition of Matthew 5:42 and the Lukan rendition of the same saying—“Give to the one who asks of you, and do not refuse anyone who wants to borrow from you… If someone takes your coat, do not withhold your shirt from them” (Luke 6:29). Luke opts for the more general term αἴρω (“I take”) instead of κριθῆναι (“to be sued”) and Matthew’s gloss expands the application beyond legal bounds. Apparently the disciples are to provide any and all of their property to those who would take it from them: “From one who takes away your goods do not demand them back” (Luke 6:30).

More to the point, the notion that one’s nakedness would bring disrepute upon the victorious party has little historical basis. Stripping the defeated and the inferior of their covering was an age-old method of shaming the enemy (cf. Revelation 17:16, Ezekiel 16:37-39). The naked bodies of those hung upon crosses constituted a powerful public reminder of the state’s incomparable ability to humiliate even beyond death. Jesus himself was stripped of his clothes in the πραιτώριον, the residence of the governor, before a large company of soldiers (Matthew 27:27-28). It was Jesus who incurred shame here, not the Roman officials.

Wink’s instincts on this account are thus exactly wrong and once again a better explanation presents itself: Jesus believed that the voluntary relinquishment of one’s possessions to evildoers characterized those who patiently trusted in God to exact vengeance within the foreseeable future—“Do not fret because of the wicked; do not be envious of wrongdoers, for they will soon fade like the grass and wither like the green herb… The wicked borrow and do not pay back, but the righteous are generous and keep giving; surely those blessed by the Lord shall inherit the land, but those cursed by him shall be cut off” (Psalm 37:1-2, 21-22). The total and willing dispossession of the righteous would paradoxically, and within a timely manner, bring about the kingdom of God over the nations.

Bless the one who compels you to go one mile by going a second mile

Wink’s last attempt is his least persuasive. The compulsion of defeated peoples for the cause of imperial business was not uncommon in the ancient world. Men could be drafted into the military, sold into slavery, worked to the point of death, or simply killed in the chaos of pillaging. In the Roman context, soldiers compelled non-citizens to perform a variety of tasks (cf. Mark 15:21) and based on Jesus’ saying in Matthew 5:41 it has been stipulated that this practice often took the form of a forced march, carrying a soldier’s gear, for the duration of a mile. This much is true. Yet contrary to Wink’s reconstruction, no evidence of any limitation on the custom has been documented. It is unlikely that the pagan government was interested in the prosecution of its own soldiers, even those who had over-exerted the unruly peasants of some occupied territory. Furthermore, far from complicating the life of the soldier, voluntary assistance of the imperial army was an obvious way to befriend the emperor and thus accrue honor. A Christian who did more than he was commanded—thus signaling his loyalty to the regime—might well receive a reward. Going the second mile for an imperial official, like praying for, blessing, and giving food to one’s enemies, was a concrete way to ingratiate oneself to the ruling class. Such actions, of course, were deemed treasonous by the zealots who longed for Jewish dominion in Israel.

Christ’s apparent collaboration with the pagan empire here, of course, sits awkwardly within his larger theocratic and nationalistic program—the Davidic kingdom of Israel’s God over all the tribes of the earth. But as with his other sayings prohibiting retaliation, what Jesus is depicting is the “hard path” and the “narrow gate,” a strenuous code of conduct that will lead to life for those who uphold it. This is thus not cooperation for the sake of Rome’s continued supremacy—such perhaps being the aim of Josephus and some Sadducees—but it is rather an eschatological strategy for a period of perceived crisis, the lull before the coming flood (Matthew 7:24-27). If the reign of the Messiah was at hand—if the days of the idolatrous empire were numbered—then the disciples of Christ were obligated to maintain an excruciating lifestyle of non-resistance until God swept away the enemies of his people and rewarded his saints. By doing what was reprehensible, by voluntarily aiding the kingdom of the demons, they would stack hot coals upon the Empire’s mantle and call into being the wrath and fury of God.

This was the logic manifest to those who were trapped within the apocalyptic storm conjured by John, Jesus, the destruction of Jerusalem, and the imperial persecutions of the 1st century—pinned, as it were, between the rock of God’s seeming fulfillment of his covenant oaths to Israel by raising his Messiah from the dead and the hard place of an increasingly hostile pagan imperium. By leaning into the pain of such crises, surely catharsis would be achieved: “Will not God grant vengeance to his chosen ones who cry to him day and night? Will he delay long in helping them? I tell you, he will quickly grant vengeance to them” (Luke 18:7-8).