"Renounce war and proclaim peace." Doctrine and Covenants 98:16
I read this the other day and it peaked my interest. Continuing my reading, I read how the Lord instructs that, if our families are "smitten" and "ye bear it patiently and revile not, . . . neither seek revenge, ye shall be rewarded" (v. 23). God says to do this three times. On the fourth time, God has "delivered thine enemy into thine hands" (v. 29). BUT, "if thou wilt spare him, thou shalt be rewarded for thy righteousness" (v. 30). God continues by applying this to Governments: "If any nation . . proclaim war against [you], . . . first lift a standard of peace unto that people" (v. 34). God says to do this until the third time, then you are justified in going out to war.
So, what do you all think of this? I have been developing a theory of pacifism (Dad doesn't think it should be called that but I can't think of a better word) where we never attack other countries under any circumstance, but instead pour our resources into developing ways to better protect our homeland and prevent attacks. In other words, wars like Afghanistan and Iraq would be unjustified. Protecting innocent peoples from being invaded by others is okay (we defend those countries and drive the invaders out). So, wars like Kosovo would be justified.
What do you think?
What do you think?
ReplyDeleteI am going to try that in my family. :)
ReplyDeleteI think that there would be no Jews left in Europe. I know that we tried to stay out of it until we were forcefully brought in, but how many millions of people would have been spared, had we not? I don't think we should do it for resources, but I am not willing to see people annihalated (spelling). Do we apply that to our neighbors and if we see the dad beating his kid/wife we don't jump into it we just ask him to please stop? I know, really simplistic, but I don't think too deeply these days.
I do think that there may be times that we go into countries for the wrong reasons. In those cases, I am all with you.
Too be honest though, I would rather fight the war on their ground then have them come and invade us here and fight it in the US....
I guess I didn't make myself clear enough: Where innocent people are attacked, we can protect them. Jews are okay. BUT, if, for example, Lebanon invaded Israel, we would only go in to expel the Labenese, not to attack them on their land.
ReplyDeleteGottcha. Okay, so let me see if I have this straight. We could/would go and protect Israel in as much as getting the invaders out, but we aren't going to go into the other country to kick them around. That makes sense to me. I do have to say, when it comes to fighting terrorists, I don't know what the right answer is. I am not sure why we are in Afghanistan, are we doing any good, are we helping their country be a safer place at all? I DO think that Iraq had a terrorist goverment and that the people there did need to be protected. North Korea, they scare the crap out of me but I don't think we should go in and invade them. Did I follow your line of thinking?
ReplyDeleteIf I understand what you are saying, we should forgive the Al qaeda for trying to blow up the trade towers the first time, and the second time and not retaliate. Then if they nuke a football game we should not retaliate either until the do it a fourth time. Then we can do whatever we want including invade their land. Let's see what is their land.
ReplyDeleteWhat then happens if we have Hesbollah claim fame to blowing up and airplane and then a bomb in a mall and then a suicide bomber in an train debot.
Then another splinter group and another and another. Do we continue to forgive until the fourth time.
While this is going to sound crazy the answer is yes. What did the Nephites do time after time after time when the Lamanites attacked them. The defended themselves, but did not retaliate. The spent time and energy building forts and fortifications. We are fighting a different battle that takes different resourse. We really have no where to attack terrorists because they do not live in one place. Are we goint to stall all of them. No. Will we be attacked in our malls, maybe. But I would agree that we would be better of spending our resources on protection here than fighting abroad.
sorry about the spelling and gramar. It is late and I am sure that you can all speak in tongues.
ReplyDeleteI think we should be forgiving also, but with dirty bombs, bio warfare, and mass terrorism, forgiving four times means we would all be dead. I feel we need to find the perpitrators before they strike. Arrest them and re-educate them for as long as it takes to convince them we are not a threat to them. How can we do otherwise and save ourselves and our children? Mom
ReplyDelete