When it comes to violence and Jesus, your first thought is probably the story of the money changers. In Matthew 21:12:
And Jesus went into the temple of God, and cast out all them that sold and bought in the temple, and overthrew the tables of the moneychangers, and the seats of them that sold doves,
Mark 11:15:
And they come to Jerusalem: and Jesus went into the temple, and began to cast out them that sold and bought in the temple, and overthrew the tables of the moneychangers, and the seats of them that sold doves;
And John 2:15:
And when he had made a scourge of small cords, he drove them all out of the temple, and the sheep, and the oxen; and poured out the changers’ money, and overthrew the tables.
In this story, Jesus performs several violent or destructive acts:
- Casting/driving out the moneychangers and the livestock
- Overthrowing tables and seating
- Pouring out money
- Creating and (presumably) using a whip
This story is often told with the point being that we should respect the house of God. But Jesus’s example of how he defends God’s house is not something we should overlook.
And while we use such scriptures as Matthew 5:39 (“whosoever shall smite thee on thy right cheek, turn to him the other also.”) or verse 44 (“Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them which despitefully use you, and persecute you”) to support the idea that Jesus taught love and non-violence, there are teachings or examples where he advocates violence.
Take Matthew 10:34–35:
Think not that I am come to send peace on earth: I came not to send peace, but a sword.
For I am come to set a man at variance against his father, and the daughter against her mother, and the daughter in law against her mother in law.
He seems to contradict the message of peace found in the Sermon on the Mount, which appears earlier in Matthew.
Also, during the Last Supper, after he prophesied that Peter would deny him 3 times, he asked them, “When I sent you without purse, and scrip, and shoes, lacked ye any thing?” They answered by saying they lacked nothing. He follows up on his declaration to teach without purse or scrip with the following admonition:
But now, he that hath a purse, let him take it, and likewise his scrip: and he that hath no sword, let him sell his garment, and buy one.
They responded to this admonition by telling him that they had 2 swords, and he responded with, “It is enough.”
People may use the example of Peter cutting off the high priest’s ear as Jesus condemning violence when he declares (in Matthew 26:52) after the ear cutting:
Put up again thy sword into his place: for all they that take the sword shall perish with the sword.
It’s clear in the first part that he is speaking to Peter. The verse even says, “Then said Jesus unto him”. But what if the second part wasn’t directed to Peter, as we tend to assume it was? What if he had instead turned to the gathered mob at that moment and warned, “all they that take the sword shall perish with the sword”? What if he was warning them that those who, just hours before, he had told to arm themselves and who had were willing to defend themselves against violence?
Jesus certainly did preach peace, but he didn’t preach peace and pacifism at all costs. For the radical Jesus, violence and destruction were options.
