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Introduction
It is the expectations of every human being that the world will be a peaceful place where one would be able to live without fear of being attacked by anybody. Many people in the world expect to that they will live with each other as brothers and sisters without hatred and the idea of having to engage in battles and loosing lives in the process.
Unfortunately, that has never been the case and at one time all the other people have found themselves in situations where they have to engage in war rather than protect themselves or otherwise. The world has never been as peaceful as people would have wanted it to be and war has manifested itself as part of the human life.
Various religions have argued that at a certain point war is justified and have tried to give it a moral perspective while they also put it that war is not permitted in their teachings which are meant to spread the message of peace.
Morality of Warfare
War leads to destruction of property, eviction of people from their homes, rape, body injuries among other effects and above all it leads to loss of lives. In religion loss of life is extensively talked about and it is seen as a sin therefore, war should not be permitted on this grounds (Wainwright 2005).
However, it is important to note that there are situations where war becomes the only option of searching for peace or else more people will die. In this regard warfare has gained a moral perspective with people arguing that it will be utmost immorality if a government would let its citizens die from invasion by another country (Kelsay 2009).
A country is therefore justified to protect its boundaries and prevent any aggression by any enemy into its territory. However, the way that the war is conducted will determine whether the war can be justified morally or not.
Islam and Warfare
From the onset it is paramount to state that Islam as a religion condemns warfare at its utmost definition. In line with this Islam teaches peace and according to their Quran people should be welcoming to one another and help their neighbors when they need help. Islam requires that human beings should try and solve their differences through dialogue and ensure that peace prevails always as this will be the spreading of Allah’s love to mankind.
Additionally, it is the teachings of the Islam religion that people should trade fairly with those who seek to make peace and not war and coexist in harmony with them (Wainwright 2005). In this line, Islamic religion prohibits aggression or invasion of other people’s territories because of greed for power and other unholy reasons.
Nevertheless, Islam also allows people to protect their territory from any enemy who may either attack them or be planning to attack. Additionally, Muslims are required to protect their faith from any form of abuse by any person because that amounts to an abuse to Allah.
On top of that, the Islam religion teaches that human basic rights are sacred and should be protected therefore the Quran allows the Muslim to engage in warfare if their basic rights are being infringed (Kelsay 2009). It should be noted that the Quran only allows the Muslim to engage in war if their faith is threatened and there is need to protect it but abhors war if the Muslim will engage in war in order to spread the Islamic religion.
The oppressed in society need help and protection from despotism against them while people have a right to stay at their homes without eviction.
Any violation of this is against the Quran and in that case the Muslim is permitted to fight to protect people who are forceful evicted from their homes because they are Muslims and the oppressed in the society. According to Islam, jihad is not terrorism but a term referring to war pursued for self defense (Kelsay 2009).
Consequently, Islamic religion gives guidelines on how war should be carried out and how the fighters should conduct themselves during war.
To begin with, Islam allows war against those who fight you and not against those who seek peace (Kelsay 2009) therefore it highly prohibits Muslims from causing harm and killing civilians during war but rather dictates that non-combatants should be treated in a humane manner.
Additionally, the Muslim rules of war outline that in the course of any war, Muslims should be very careful not to destroy trees and crops and at the same time spare all the animals for they can not fight back.
In conjunction with that, Muslims are expected to conduct themselves with utmost discipline in event of war and fight with as minimum force as possible without any anger and treat their prisoners of war as humanly as possible (Wainwright 2005).
It should however be noted that, war, or jihad as Muslims call it, should be the last resort after all avenues of peace have halted at a dead end and the war should be within the laid down rules by the Quran (Kelsay 2009).
Muslims should not attack other nations since Allah abhors transgressors, but they should also be ready to defend themselves if provoked. The Quran not only allows idolaters to be pursued and killed but also gives room for forgiveness if they repent. Unless the war is fought in the ways of God, Islam does not support it and condemns brutality, cruelty, injustice and shedding of blood.
Christianity’s Perspective
Christianity requires its followers to follow the commandments that are set out in the bible in totality and any deviance from the same is taken as a sin. Among the commandments of Christianity is the commandment that one should not kill.
In this regard, Christians are prohibited from shedding blood of another person. But in the Old Testament the Bible says that, if one sheds blood of a fellow human being then his blood will also be shed by a human being. It therefore means that war was justified by the Old Testament and the early church.
However, Jesus spread the message of peace and therefore all Christians are expected to be promoters of peace and coexistence in the society. In this regard, a group of Christians, known as pacifists, who strictly follow the teachings of Christ as they are written in the New Testament, believe that war is totally wrong.
Pacifists argue that Jesus preached love and accepted suffering on the cross without returning evil for evil therefore Christians should not return evil for evil (Wainwright 2005).
However, in the New Testament the bible says that the function of any authority is to protect citizens. It goes ahead to say that nations have swords to protect the good and condemn evil. On top of that, American bishops in their letter dated may 3rd 1983 agree that each nation has a right to defend itself but disapproves offensive war.
In conjunction with that, the modern churches believe that though war is not good, it is sometimes necessary to fight for peace to be found. St. Augustine of Hippo, borrowing from the just war theory, gave reasons why war could be justified in Christianity and within the rules of the bible.
St. Augustine’s position was also supported by Thomas Aquinas. According to the just war theory, war can be justifiable and be morally correct in the event that negotiations as well as any peaceful efforts of conflict resolution have proofed futile (Wainwright 2005). This is contrary to the stand of pacifists who believe that people should not fight even when they are provoked.
Contrary to pacifism, just war theory states that war is necessary but should be instituted by governments and not individuals. This is also the argument of the reformation and modern day churches. Therefore, war can be justified in the event that it is for self-defense and not for transgression or other political reasons which are not within the teachings of Christianity.
War initiated by individuals or a small group of people who are angry because of one reason or the other is against Christianity (Wainwright 2005). In addition to that, the intention of the war should not be for material gain for example power or natural resources but rather genuine and selfless motives.
On top of that, the means used for the war should be appropriate for the intention of the war and the war should bring peace in the end and not further problems. War for the sake of peace is also supported by Christian realists among them Niebuhr, who publicly supported First World War yet he was a pastor at Detroit.
In conjunction to that, Christians believe that for a war to be just then the civilians or non-combatants should not be harmed and there should be no massive destruction of property for no good reason (Wainwright 2005).
Comparison between the Two
Christianity and Islam preach peace and teach their followers to try as much as possible to avoid shedding of blood and any form injustice to the community. Both types of religion follow the jus ad bellum which provides the criteria to be followed before a country makes a decision of going into war.
Additionally, jus ad bellum outlines the conduct of solders during war, the need to protect civilians and the principle of proportionality, which means that a country should not use excessive force when at war.
However, the two types of religion do not share everything as regards to justification of war or rather about the morality perspective of war. As it has been depicted, Islam allows war for the protection of their faith and any threat to the Muslim faith is regarded as an abuse to Allah. On the contrary, Christianity does note advocate for war to protect their religion and neither does it allow its followers to seek for idolaters.
Conclusion
Every faith teaches peace and coexistence among people whether they profess the same faith or not. However, there comes a situation when all other avenues of peaceful conflict resolution fail and war remains as the only option.
Political realists argue that though war is ethically wrong, it is the only way to attain peace in such a situation therefore, war is sometimes necessary. Nevertheless, reasons that can lead to war are not similar and therefore various people can engage in war due to different reasons. All in all, war to some extent is morally right and justifiable.
References
Kelsay, K. (2009). Arguing the Just War in Islam. Cambridge: Harvard University Press.
Wainwright, W. J. (2005). Religion & Morality. Farnham: Ashgate Publishers.
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