Activism vs. Quietism: Where Anarchism Falls

The following is part of the Anarchy in May series which examines Christian anarchism and quotes prominent Christian anarchist thinkers. For a more detailed introduction and a table of contents, please see Anarchy in May: Brief Introduction and Contents.
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As is so often the case, the question of whether Christians are to be quietists or activists presents a false dichotomy. It is one, nevertheless, which has powerful rhetorical force. There are few, if any, legitimate quietists left in the world, and those that do exist have a relatively muted voice in the public discourse (unsurprisingly). The specter of quietism, however, looms large because any time anyone expresses any pessimism about the ultimate efficacy of human effort—divinely empowered or otherwise—they are immediately labeled as quietist heretics and left to scramble for some other justification for Christian service to society.

There is some value in this, admittedly, because quietism is antithetical to the Gospel. For our purposes here, let quietism be defined as the belief that because humanity is incapable of achieving the aims of the Kingdom by its own activities, such activities are meaningless. How can this view stand up to Scripture? Jesus came to announce the imminence of the Kingdom and with this made a clear effort to heal the sick, feed the hungry, and set the captive free. In enjoining that his disciples do the same, Jesus made impossible any honest attempt at quietism.

But activism is no less futile and no less incompatible with the true message of the Gospel. Activism is just as destructive if we understand it to be the belief that we have been tasked with the Kingdom purpose of feeding the hungry and therefore must believe it is possible and pursue as an end the total elimination of hunger by human effort (with the same being true of healing the sick and setting the captive free). Such a hope and such an effort is not only the height of human pretension, but it has always invited Christianity to align itself with decidedly unchristian forces pursuing the same ends—because, of course, it is the temporal end of defeating biological hunger which is falsely kept in the forefront.

Anarchism, properly understood, provides an alternative social ethic. Unfortunately, the temptation toward quietism is great for anarchists, and accusations of quietism make the temptation toward activism even greater. Rightly employed, however, anarchist thought invites Christians to take the possibility of achieving total implementation of the Kingdom out of the picture. In fact, at the heart of anarchism is both a hearty pessimism about human ability to achieve anything, especially the aims of the Kingdom, and the eschatological mindset which makes attempts to achieve those aims nonsensical anyway. What Christian anarchists are left with is a clear command to engage in social ethics without any confusion about whether or not society can be redeemed through our efforts.

Instead, the anarchist social ethic—active without being activist—insists that the hungry are fed as a critique of contemporary human (and therefore futile, transitory) structures of power and as a witness to the church’s proleptic experience of the eschatological Kingdom. We feed the hungry as a condemnation of a world which has refused to feed them in spite of protestations that it is within their power and as an invitation to the hope that there is a God who can make good on His promises. With this in mind, quietism can be ultimately rejected as a false Christianity which, in neglecting its social duties, is in fact neglecting the very proclamation of the Gospel, the living homily which calls people out of the flawed, oppressive, and dying world and into a community oriented toward the perfect, liberating, and eternal Kingdom. At the same time, this social ethic can never follow activism down the path of unholy alliance with the coercive and incompetent methods of secular attempts to solve social problems out of a misguided, optimistic, and ultimately idolatrous humanism.

This is not to say that Christians cannot or should not praise or even participate in efforts toward social justice out of some vague judgment that Christians can only be involved in Christian charities. (Although, if Christians were doing social justice right, it would be everyone else who would be coming to us to get involved and not the other way around.) It merely means that the social ethics enjoined by Christ and incumbent upon all Christians are not an end unto themselves to be pursued by any means and with any company. Almost more importantly, the social aims of the Kingdom are certainly and necessarily beyond the scope of human power to achieve, and any confusion on that point is an invitation to idolatry: the belief that if we just work hard enough, there are human solutions through which every little African baby will be cured of AIDS and every American can have health insurance and all God’s children can eat their fill of organic, free-trade flaxseed burgers. We pursue social justice not because we can achieve it but as a testimony to our participation in a kingdom and commitment to a king Who, greater and more faithful than human governments, can do all we ask or imagine.

Anarchy in May: Tolstoy on Moral Culpability

The following is part of the Anarchy in May series which examines Christian anarchism and quotes prominent Christian anarchist thinkers. For a more detailed introduction and a table of contents, please see Anarchy in May: Brief Introduction and Contents.
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The previous quote from William Lloyd Garrison was drawn from Leo Tolstoy's The Kingdom of God is Within You. Unsurprisingly, Tolstoy himself--regarded by many to be the seminal figure in modern Christian anarchism, probably more for his notoriety than any novelty or innovation on his part--had plenty to say on the subject of the Christian relation to the state. While volumes could be filled with such quotes (and they are), consider this brief statement on the nature of moral culpability as it relates to citizen participation in civil government:

There are some people, who, without any definite reasoning about it, conclude straightway that the responsibility of government measures rests entirely on those who resolve on them, or that the governments and sovereigns decide the question of what is good or bad for their subjects, and the duty of the subjects is merely to obey. I think that arguments of this kind only obscure men's conscience. I cannot take part in the councils of government, and therefore I am not responsible for its misdeeds... Indeed, but we are responsible for our own misdeeds. And the misdeeds of our rulers become our own, if we, knowing that they are misdeeds, assist in carrying, them out. Those who suppose that they are bound to obey the government, and that the responsibility for the misdeeds they commit is transferred from them to their rulers, deceive themselves.

Anarchy in May: Garrison on the Consequences of Non-Resistance

The following is part of the Anarchy in May series which examines Christian anarchism and quotes prominent Christian anarchist thinkers. For a more detailed introduction and a table of contents, please see Anarchy in May: Brief Introduction and Contents.
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The previous entry was my own summation of some core principles of Christian anarchism, structured by Vernard Eller. Offered at length below is William Lloyd Garrison's own restatement of Christian anarchism. Garrison, noted primarily in history of his abolitionist activities, in 1838 laid a proposal before the Society for the Establishment of Peace Among Men that outlined his view of how peace ought to be pursued. For Garrison, unlike Eller, the Christian anarchism he ends up espousing is not an overarching program pursued for its own merits. Instead, like so many others, Garrison comes to Christian anarchism primarily because he sees it as the only logical conclusion when the principles of non-resistant pacifism (drawn from Matthew 5) are applied to civil ethics. Nevertheless, the conclusion is undoubtedly an expression of Christian anarchism as defined earlier. Consider this redacted Declaration of Sentiments that Garrison rallied other non-resistants behind:

We do not acknowledge allegiance to any human government. We recognize but one King and Lawgiver, one Judge and Ruler of mankind. Our country is the world, our countrymen are all mankind. We love the land of our nativity only as we love all other lands. The interests and rights of American citizens are not dearer to us than those of the whole human race. Hence we can allow no appeal to patriotism to revenge any national insult or injury…

We regard as unchristian and unlawful not only all wars, whether offensive or defensive, but all preparations for war; every naval ship, every arsenal, every fortification, we regard as unchristian and unlawful; the existence of any kind of standing army, all military chieftains, all monuments commemorative of victory over a fallen foe, all trophies won in battle, all celebrations in honor of military exploits, all appropriations for defense by arms; we regard as unchristian and unlawful every edict of government requiring of its subjects military service.

Hence we deem it unlawful to bear arms, and we cannot hold any office which imposes on its incumbent the obligation to compel men to do right on pain of imprisonment or death. We therefore voluntarily exclude ourselves from every legislative and judicial body, and repudiate all human politics, worldly honors, and stations of authority. If we cannot occupy a seat in the legislature or on the bench, neither can we elect others to act as our substitutes in any such capacity. It follows that we cannot sue any man at law to force him to return anything he may have wrongly taken from us; if he has seized our coat, we shall surrender him our cloak also rather than subject him to punishment.

We believe that the penal code of the old covenant—an eye for an eye, and a tooth for a tooth—has been abrogated by Jesus Christ, and that under the new covenant the forgiveness instead of the punishment of enemies has been enjoined on all his disciples in all cases whatsoever. To extort money from enemies, cast them into prison, exile or execute them, is obviously not to forgive but to take retribution.

The history of mankind is crowded with evidences proving that physical coercion is not adapted to moral regeneration, and that the sinful dispositions of men can be subdued only by love; that evil can be exterminated only by good; that it is not safe to rely upon the strength of an arm to preserve us from harm; that there is great security in being gentle, long-suffering, and abundant in mercy; that it is only the meek who shall inherit the earth; for those who take up the sword shall perish by the sword.

...We shall submit to every ordinance and every requirement of government, except such as are contrary to the commands of the Gospel, and in no case resist the operation of law, except by meekly submitting to the penalty of disobedience.

But while we shall adhere to the doctrine of non-resistance and passive submission to enemies, we purpose, in a moral and spiritual sense, to assail iniquity in high places and in low places, to apply our principles to all existing evil, political, legal, and ecclesiastical institutions, and to hasten the time when the kingdoms of this world will have become the kingdom of our Lord Jesus Christ. It appears to us a self-evident truth that whatever the Gospel is designed to destroy at any period of the world, being contrary to it, ought now to be abandoned. If, then, the time is predicted when swords shall be beaten into plowshares and spears into pruning hooks, and men shall not learn the art of war any more, it follows that all who manufacture, sell, or wield these deadly weapons do thus array themselves against the peaceful dominion of the Son of God on earth.

Priest Single-Handedly Boosts Birth Rate

Here is an odd, touching, wonderful story about a prelate who, ironically, takes the imperative to "be fruitful and multiply" very personally. In addition to having perhaps the most adorable picture of a baptism as accompaniment, the Atlanta Journal Constitution reports:

The patriarch of the Georgian Orthodox Church presided over the baptism of hundreds of babies in a Tbilisi cathedral on Sunday as part of an effort credited with helping raise the birth rate in this former Soviet nation.

Patriarch Ilia II has promised to become the godfather of all babies born into Orthodox Christian families who already have two or more children. Since he began the mass baptisms in 2008, he has gained nearly 11,000 godchildren.

Georgian President Mikhail Saakashvili has said the patriarch deserves much of the credit for the rising birth rate, which in 2010 was 25 percent higher than in 2005. The number of abortions also declined by nearly 50 percent over the same five-year period.

Parents of the 400 babies baptized by an array of priests Sunday said the patriarch was instrumental in their decision to have a third or fourth child.

An Anarchist Manifesto

The following is part of the Anarchy in May series which examines Christian anarchism and quotes prominent Christian anarchist thinkers. For a more detailed introduction and a table of contents, please see Anarchy in May: Brief Introduction and Contents.
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Below, I would like to offer a summary and adaptation of Vernard Eller's twelve "basic principles of Christian Anarchy," which he adapted and expanded from Jacques Ellul. Admittedly, I have some reservations about some of Eller's points, and what follows will often gloss over or actively change those aspects in an effort to give a depiction of anarchism which I think more nearly aligns with the Christian ethos. Additionally, it warrants mention that I by no means believe that these twelve represent the best or even most basic aspects of Christian anarchism. There are principles which I would include that Eller did not. There are omissions that I would have made, even omissions of points with which I wholeheartedly agree, simply because I do not think they are basic or essential to anarchism. With all those disclaimers having been made, however, what Eller offers in this list from Christian Anarchy is a collection of important statements and clarifications about the shape of anarchism particularly suited as an apology for those facing uninformed criticisms about what it is to be a Christian anarchist.

1. In Christian anarchism, the separation from and eventual dissolution of human governments is not an end in itself.  It is only ever endorsed and pursued with the aim of making room for and anticipating the ultimate and absolute reign of God.
2. Christian anarchists are not concerned with commending anarchism as a political system superior to contemporary power structures.  As a rejection of humanly devised political systems, it would be hypocritical to propose political anarchism as an alternative to traditional hierarchical systems.
3. Christian anarchism does not even suffer from the delusion that anarchism is viable for secular society.  It admits that human structures are a necessary (or at least efficient) means for ordering a humanist world.
4. As such, Christian anarchism sees no particular threat in the existence of human structures of power.  The danger is only in accepting the legitimacy of their claims to power and mistaking for real the illusory authority they purport to possess.
5. The problem with human structures of power is not that they are "of the devil" necessarily, but that they are human.  Just as humans are invariable sinful so to are the governments they construct for themselves.  Just as humans are only redeemable in dying to themselves and being reborn to God, so anarchists look for an eschatological death of human powers and the fulfillment of the divine Kingdom.
6. Just because all structures of power are equally human (and therefore necessarily sinful) does not meant that all structures of power are equally evil, at least not teleologically.  In recognizing that the the United States government is not righteous and inevitably corrupts whoever participates in it, anarchists are not prevented from appreciating moral distinctions between the USA and Nazi Germany or Stalinist Russia.  It is possible to be aware of and even grateful for human governments that are less overtly atrocious than others without endorsing, participating in, or falling at the feet of any human government.
7. The purpose of Christian anarchism is not to actively attempt to unseat or overthrow human governments, even as their dissolution is earnestly anticipated.  As already mentioned, Christian anarchism is not intended to be an alternative political system and recognizes that pure, political anarchism is untenable as a large scale social system.  Since it would be impossible for humanity to implement anything but a human government, it would be hypocritical to attempt by human effort to replace world governments with anything else.  What's more, the very notion of actively overthrowing a human government implies an appropriation of the very coercive and sinful means that mark human governments as incompatible with the Christian religion.  "To undertake a fight against evil on its own terms (to pit power against power) is the first step in becoming the evil one opposes."
8. This unwillingness to attempt forcibly to overthrow human governments does not translate into apathy toward their evils or silence about their injustices.  "[Christ] challenges every attempt to validate the political realm and rejects its authority because it does not conform to the will of God."  Christian anarchism is not retiring simply because it refuses to incite political revolution.
9. Just as it is not silent about the evil of government, it is not apathetic about the injustices in society.  Anarchists are not so lost in the eschatological vision of a God who is going to "settle things in the end anyway" that it lacks the grounds for social engagement.  In truth, it is the eschatological vision of a legitimate power structure and the church's proleptic experience of that reality on which the social ethic is grounded.  Anarchists seek to be like Jeremiah's exiles in Babylon, to "seek the welfare of the city where I have sent you into exile, and pray to the Lord on its behalf."  Such a social conscience cannot, however, be construed as an endorsement of the legitimacy of Babylon.
10. Christian anarchists are not ignorant or afraid of politics, not if they are responsible Christians.  Anarchists are always willing to engage with human governments, but always as outsiders, always true to their critique of finite structures of power, and always aware of the ethical dangers involved in political contact.
11. Christian anarchism is active but not activist, clearly and definitely engaged in the world without any false pretension about the scope of human ability or goodness.  It is eschatological rather than utopian, recognizing that the human mind is incapable of independently conceiving of what a perfect society might look like.  It is narrowly rather than broadly focused, thoroughly skeptical of any suggestion that changes at the top might invoke a systemic reformation of society.  Finally it is realistic rather than dramatic; because it is not interested in selling a partisan vision of the world in an effort to provoke action from one end of the spectrum or the other it has the benefit of being able to candidly assess what is and is not in the scope of human ability.
12. Christian anarchism is committed to the Christian notion of freedom which is distinct from the political notion of autonomy.  Governments, and all human structures of power, cannot give you either, though it is common in the prevailing rhetoric to hear the latter promised under the name of the former.  Christian anarchism, on the other hand, rejects the stress on autonomy characteristic of secular, political anarchism of all stripes in favor of the Christian notion of freedom, the freedom to pursue God and to attempt to enact His will free from any artificial and exterior constraints.  It is, in essence, the freedom from the second master of humanistic politics and the recognition that in trying to serve both, Christians are wont to emphasize that which appears nearer rather than the God who seems distant.

Anarchy in May: David Lipscomb on Virtue in Politics

The following is part of the Anarchy in May series which examines Christian anarchism and quotes prominent Christian anarchist thinkers. For a more detailed introduction and a table of contents, please see Anarchy in May: Brief Introduction and Contents.
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It seems only fitting to begin the month with a quote from perhaps my favorite Christian anarchist of all (though he would have never applied that term to himself), David Lipscomb:

The rule of justice, right and virtue in political affairs is a hallucination or dream that will never be realized.

Anarchy in May: Brief Introduction and Contents

I have lamented in the past that I have not been able (or at least not disposed) to offer a comprehensive statement of my beliefs about the relationship of Christian's to civil government. What follows, as before, is unfortunately still not such a statement--and I doubt that a venue such as this could ever really provide an appropriate means for an exhaustive study of the type I imagine, the type which has already been undertaken by countless greater minds than mine. Nevertheless, I have resolved in May to dedicate extensive space here to a discussion of Christian anarchism and to an exhibition of quotes from Christian anarchists who I respect (even if I do not always agree with their particular variety of anarchism). Because political strains of anarchism are again rising to the top of cultural consciousness as a new generation latches on to their anti-statist, anti-capitalist, or anti-globlization impulses it becomes critical to distinguish Christian anarchism from these human, revolutionary movements.

Christian anarchism is the belief that there is no legitimate source of authority other than God and that, in view of this, all attempts by humans at self-government are illegitimate. As all human structures of power are illegitimate, they can only sustain themselves through illegitimate means, namely the sinful use of coercive force. Insofar as recognition of human governments is the recognition of a false authority (i.e. idolatry) and participation in human governments requires, directly or indirectly, the sinful employment of violence, it is the duty of Christians to abstain from allegiance to them. The Christian anarchist holds citizenship in only one kingdom and swears fealty only to one king, obeying temporal authorities not by virtue of the legitimacy but only in so far as it is consonant with one's duty to the only true, legitimate authority. (In other words, when John F. Rowe snidely inquires whether or not a Christian should pay taxes, we may answer with David Lipscomb, "Aye, as a Christian, not as a citizen of human government; as a part of his religion, as a duty to God, he pays taxes to whatever government he is under.") In all this, the Christian anarchist looks to--without presuming to instigate by human means--the eschatological dissolution of human governments promised in Scripture.

That brief statement leaves a tremendous amount of room for elaboration, but I hope the treatment of Christian anarchism in the coming weeks will contribute substance, both historical and theoretical, to yield a fuller picture of what it means to be a Christian anarchist. The following is a list of entries in this series which will be linked as they appear:


David Lipscomb on Virtue in Politics
An Anarchist Manifesto
Garrison on the Consequences of Non-Resistance
Tolstoy on Moral Culpability
Activism vs. Quietism: Where Anarchism Falls
Bender on the Anabaptist Vision
Chelčický on Romans 13
Romans 13: Love, Vengeance, and Anarchy
Eller on the Just Society (Pt. 1)
Eller on the Just Society (Pt. 2)
Eller on the Just Society (Pt. 3)
Anarchism and the Just Society
Jesus on Ethics