Religion,Hermeneutics and Violence: An Introduction

Introduction

In the introduction to Cruel Creeds, Virtuous Violence, Jack David Eller states that ‘the world is awash with books on religion and violence, but then the world is awash in religious violence’. ¹ Scholars have claimed at least 300 contributing causes to violence in the name of God. ² If there is one lesson to be learned from this torrent of scholarship it is this: violence in the name of God is complex and oversimplification further jeopardises peace because it obscures many of the factors actually contributing to the conflict. Blame for this violence has been pinned on nearly every area of human experience. For better or worse, multidisciplinary research abounds. ³ It is the purpose of this special edition to examine a particular aspect of religion and violence, namely the hermeneutics of violence. The articles analyse the instigation and perpetration of violence that is encouraged by particular readings of a sacred text. Comprehending that most killing has an internal rationale, these articles seek to examine the contexts and religious groups from which violence has been perpetrated. To do so the articles focus on particular locales and time periods to examine the specificity of violence. Readings of the Christian Bible as an inspiration for violence for Christian groups or theological traditions is a major focus of this edition of Transformation. These articles examine the way in which the Christian scriptures are interpreted for violent ends. They take the interpretation by violent actors seriously and examine the belief formation processes whereby the actors come to believe that their violence is sanctioned by God. Whilst the writers of the articles hold alternative hermeneutics to those they study, the purpose of the issue is to hear and understand those who hold a different view, by examining at a profound level the readings they give and the context that engendered such readings. Whilst some writers point to alternative readings which promote peace and reconciliation and suggest ways in which the texts have been misunderstood, the main focus of attention is on comprehending the rationale for violence. This principle of scrutinising the unpleasant or uncomfortable is an important one for missiologists. In order to effect true, peaceful transformation a study of the dynamics of violence is required.

This introductory article prepares the way for the others by presenting pertinent issues on the current scholarship surrounding religion and violence so that readers may set the contextual articles in a broader framework of concern. It examines the contested claims surrounding the nature of religion and violence as advocated by those involved in contemporary debates. It elucidates particular themes which are apparent in the articles here and it points to theory and future questions.

Religion as the Cause of Violence?

Much of the scholarship on religion and violence was occasioned by the attacks of September 11th and the response to it. Before 9/11 there was considerable interest in the cults, religion and violence. However, a new sense of western vulnerability coupled with a shock over the resurgence of ‘religion’ in what was meant to be a ‘secular’ era dominated initial reactions. Prominent reactionaries, frequently termed the New Atheists, pushed for the removal of religion from the public sphere and sought to marginalise all beliefs they perceived to be superstitious and harmful. Due, in part, to their influence it became common knowledge that religion was dangerous. For the sake of peace, religion must be disarmed. For example, Hector Avalos argues that the reduction of religious violence necessitates the eradication or fundamental alteration of scripture. ⁴ Further, he excludes the vast majority of humans from the peacemaking process: ‘Involving religion in decision making is never a good idea if the goal is to eliminate or at least minimise violence’. ⁵ Solutions must be imposed on the religious majority by the outside secularist minority. Though arguments from the New Atheists have gained widespread attention, others have considered their solution to violence in the name of God to be naive or counterproductive. ⁶

In an ironic twist, one is now likely to read that the reactions of these atheists are dangerous. For example, Karen Armstrong modified René Girard’s theory and asserted that ‘modern society has made a scapegoat of faith’. ⁷ This is a serious accusation since Girard’s theory argues that scapegoating keeps the participants in the dark (ironically unenlightened) as they seek social stability through driving out one who is not primarily to blame. ⁸ Blaming religion allowed the non-religious to ignore their role in creating and sustaining conflict. Later she called Richard Dawkins dangerously over-simplistic on this issue. ⁹ As the New Atheists rightly emphasised the role of beliefs in contributing to violence they fashioned themselves as the mirror image of the ‘fundamentalists’ they decried. ¹⁰ Increasingly, scholars have argued that violence and demonising is a human problem, and violence in the name of God is one of many expressions of this shared weakness. ¹¹ Blame for religious violence is sometimes attributed to the religious and non-religious alike. ¹²

Scapegoating religion is problematic for another reason – violence is not the only, or even the dominant, result of religious practice. With reference to Christianity Philippe Buc has noted:

If one embarks on the ship of value judgements, one should see also that Christianity has engendered mature human rights and just-war doctrines. It has also brought into being intense commitment to humanitarian action …. The form that human rights and just war have taken is genealogically unthinkable without Christianity. ¹³

Further, there is good reason to question whether ‘secularism’ alone is suited to countering violence in the name of God – never mind formulating a binding universal argument that this violence should not exist. ¹⁴

Violence in the name of God is rarely understood – and lay observers cannot be expected to know all the complex motivations behind violence in the name of God. Varieties of lethal force have included national or tribal warfare, honour killings, lone-wolf acts, suicide bombings and impromptu mob violence. In a survey of ‘religious hostility’ in 2012 alone, Rodney Stark and Katie E Corcoran ‘assembled 810 incidents of religiously motivated homicides, in which 5,026 people died: 3,774 Muslims, 1,045 Christians, 110 Buddhists, 23 Jews, 21 Hindus, and 53 secular individuals’. ¹⁵ This tally was conservative – excluding ‘several thousand events for which religious motivation was not certain’. ¹⁶

If specialists struggle with the complexity and sheer quantity of violence in the name of God, then a lay observer cannot possibly be expected to know the minutiae of every incident. However, if one recognises the human proclivity for oversimplifying complex issues – often manifested as splitting the world between clearly defined good and bad – one is in a much better position to understand one’s world. ¹⁷ When the media presents an act of violence in the name of God as irrational and monocausal, an observer can know that reality is likely much more complex than the summary on the news.

It is imperative that we endeavour to understand violence – and not merely denounce it. If we understand we may be better able to prevent – thereby occasioning less violence in need of denouncing. ¹⁸ Understanding is to some degree possible. Charles Mabee notes that ‘most human violence is quite rational’. ¹⁹ One may disagree with the act of killing or its articulation and justification, but there is usually a logic behind it. As James W Jones rightly notes, ‘understanding an action in no way means excusing it; explaining an action in no way means condoning it’. ²⁰ However, we are in a much better position for having tried to understand. ²¹ Further, those who commit violence are usually relatively normal. ²² Pushing against oversimplification and demonisation, Graeme Wood’s article in The Atlantic entitled ‘What ISIS really wants’ argued that members of ISIS are not psychopaths. He argues that the group has carefully thought out beliefs and goals. Arguments that shrilly proclaim the ‘insanity’ and ‘nilhilism’ of ISIS are unlikely to gain much traction among thoughtful missiologists. ²³ Missiologists are expected to examine the conceptual categories of their subjects and to ask about their rationale, rather than impose their own ways of viewing the world. However, in situations of violence the laudable desire to bring it to an end as swiftly as possible can make the situation worse if the mind-set of the perpetrators is not studied.

The articles here are spread across continents and centuries thus resourcing the study of violence from a broad field and avoiding the assumption that dominant, contemporary comprehensions are necessarily normative. Whether examining the beliefs held by the Franks in medieval Europe about God’s relationship to their conflict or analysing the religious justification for societal oppression in contemporary India, care must be given to understanding how people formed and expressed beliefs about the righteousness of their killing. Among other things, when examining religion, hermeneutics and violence in each group care must be given to their sacred text, culture, perceived challenges and threats, symbols, modes of processing reality and remembering conflict and their conception of their place in history.

What is Religious Violence?

As mentioned before, there is a torrent of scholarship the links between religion and violence – some scapegoating and some acquitting religion of causal responsibility. In addition to questioning the cause of violence in the name of God, the very existence of ‘religious violence’ is contested. Current scholarship is in an awkward position where some consider almost everything to be religious violence and others consider almost nothing to be religious violence. Depending on the scholar, religious violence is ubiquitous or non-existent.

A thorough-going condemnation of religion as inherently violent is one response. Another is to place religions in hierarchies of violence. Buddhism, as understood in the western world, is considered to be a particularly peaceable religion not withstanding reports of violence in Myanmar. ²⁴ Christianity, when understood as the handmaid of colonialism introducing ‘the gun, the bible and the “anthropologist”’, has been considered to be a contender for most violent, oppressive religion. ²⁵ Today the actions of radical Islamists have caused some to accuse Islam of being innately more violent than other religions.

Some take a broad view of ‘religion’ allowing it to encompass patriotism, nationalism, belief in justice, belief in meaning, etc. If there is violence, it is likely that someone somewhere will find something religious in it. Clearly, transcendent meaning can be attached to the state, but it does not follow that this should be classified as religious violence. ‘Religion’ is so elastic that it can be blamed for all manner of disliked behaviours. For example, a recent article used an admittedly broad definition of religion and claimed to illuminate the ‘implicit religion of school shootings’. ²⁶ School shooters do not state their religious motivation, it is implied – even though many are vocal atheists. The authors find ‘religion’ in the shooter’s existential concerns like death, isolation, identity, freedom and meaning. Existential concerns are normally the domain of religion – hence the ‘implicit religion’. The closest the shooters actually come to expressing something overtly religious is in phrases like ‘we martyrs’, ‘we will raise hell’, ‘Eric Harris ist Gott’ or ‘I feel … God-like’. It is worth mentioning since, if the media picks up on it, it will be yet another nail in the coffin of dangerous religion. However, the article has defined religion so broadly that it ceases to be informative. One should expect that a school shooter would express ‘meaning’. It would be very odd indeed if they articulated no reasons for their killing. Similarly, one should expect that, when theists kill, they will articulate fragments of their theology. When atheists kill, it is likely that their worldview influenced when and why they believed the act was permissible.

On the opposite end of the spectrum from those who see religious violence everywhere, there are also those who seriously question the category ‘religion’ and by extension ‘religious violence’. The ‘religion-causes-violence’ position is the result of a misguided enlightenment project. It wrongly scapegoated religion in an attempt to create stability. ²⁷ It also falsely and anachronistically dichotomised religion and irreligion, sacred and secular, private and public beliefs and faith and reason. It was historically unthinkable to separate sacred from secular. Modern ‘secular’ cultures did not create a transcendent-free society – they replaced one myth with another, and sanctified violence in that new name.

William Cavanaugh argues in The Myth of Religious Violence that there is no transcultural and transhistorical phenomenon called ‘religion’ that is especially prone to violence. If the term ‘religion’ is used, the author should orient the reader to definitional difficulties. ²⁸ For example, in the introduction to Blood that Cries Out from the Earth, James W Jones notes how there are dozens of definitions of terrorism and in a class he taught on religion, ‘after 15 weeks [of trying to define religion] we had utterly failed at the task …. So arriving at the definition of “religious terrorism” would seem to involve combining the unknown with the obscure’. ²⁹ Few books dealing with violence in the name of God acknowledge the problems involved in defining religion. Cavanaugh writes:

I have no doubt that ideologies and practices of all kinds—including … Islam and Christianity—can and do promote violence under certain conditions. What I challenge as incoherent is that there is something called religion—a genus of which Christianity, Islam, Hinduism, and so on are species—which is necessarily more inclined towards violence than are ideologies and institutions that are identified as secular. ³⁰

Cavanaugh’s thesis aims to correct those who simplistically blame religion as the primary causal factor in many conflicts. Ephraim Radner has interacted significantly with this work and helpfully shows some strengths and weaknesses in the argumentation. ³¹ In an effort to move beyond this semantic debate, Rabbi Jonathan Sacks recently coined the term ‘altruistic evil’ to describe ‘evil committed in a sacred cause, in the name of high ideals’. He argues that ‘there is nothing specifically religious about’ it. ³²

Some have noted how terming something ‘religious violence’ actually allows onlookers to avoid asking difficult questions about their own group. Many are alarmed by the killing of ‘others’ – the LRA, Boko Haram, Al Qaeda, Islamic State or lone-wolf terrorists. This, in the view of many, is irrational religious violence par excellence. If some secularists are ready to condemn religion as a prime genitor of violence, those who adhere to particular religious traditions often distance themselves from the violence carried out by co-religionists by claiming it has nothing to do with their religion. Those involved in sectarian violence in Northern Ireland, for example, were said to be ‘not real Christians’, and jihadists are said to be acting against the peaceful tenets of Islam because ‘Terrorism has no religion’. ³³ Co-religionists, in wanting to avoid the criticism of irrationality and, more significantly, in wanting to assert that their own non-violent (or less-violent) view is the correct one, can encourage a willful lack of attention to the causes of violence in the name of religion and the role of sacred texts in facilitating that violence. As we have already mentioned, there are problems with attributing causality solely to religion. However, it is argued that much of the turmoil in the Middle East and elsewhere is the direct result of colonisation and, more recently, of forced modernisation. Western nations went through a slow, gradual and internal process of modernisation and then forced this process on outside nations quickly and violently – contributing to many problems in the Middle East. ³⁴ Modern secularists then denounce ‘religious violence’ as if ‘secularism’ is not a large part of the problem. However, ‘terrorism is fundamentally and inherently political, even when other motives—religious, economic or social—are involved’. ³⁵ If this is true, then the secular scapegoating of religion is dangerous because it ignores legitimate grievances and deflects blame away from those who actually contributed to the conflict. ‘Uncritical deployment of the categories of the religious and secular severely limits analysis of international politics and social change throughout the world’. ³⁶ The need to categorise violence – into sacred and secular – may actually be a hindrance to peace.

Religion is often conceptualised in contrast to its secular counterpart. But what does ‘secular’ mean and what is ‘secularism’? In recent years, many have critiqued, altered or – in some cases – abandoned core beliefs about the secular and secularism: (1) religion is no longer thought to be in decline; (2) secular societies are variegated and often very religious; (3) secularism is not value neutral or the product of a negation of beliefs; (4) secularism does not necessarily lead to greater freedom; (5) many think secularisation is ill equipped to support universal human rights; (6) secularists are often militantly dogmatic, uncompromising and uncritical; (7) a healthy society values both faith and reason and avoids the dangers in overemphasising one to the exclusion of the other. ³⁷ Faith and sacred texts are here to stay. Jacques Berlinerblau writes: ‘In truth, the Bible’s recent — and we believe, temporary — furlough from cultural supremacy has done little to lessen its relevance for our lives’. Believers and nonbelievers alike still think and act biblically – scripture has ‘become lodged in the muscle memory of civilisation’. ³⁸ In light of this, the fact that ‘today’s secularists are biblically illiterate’ is troubling. ³⁹

Many have approached the issue of violence by looking at the nature of humans. Jonathan Haidt claims that humans are prone to conflict because all people (theist, agnostic and atheist) are self-righteous hypocrites. ⁴⁰ If this is true, then many of these dangers might not lie mainly in ‘religion’ but in humanity. In Virtuous Violence, Alan Page Fiske and Tage Shakti Rai argue that most violence has an important moral element to it. ⁴¹ Without denying other ‘non-moral motives for violence’, they argue that ‘most violence under most ordinary conditions in all cultures throughout history and prehistory’ is morally motivated. ⁴² They argue that humans are by nature moral and that this sense of morality contributes to violence. In the words of Stephen Pinker: ‘The world has far too much morality’. ⁴³ We tend to call violence ‘senseless’ when it is devoid of moral motivations or is supported with weak justifications. Though it is easy to recall examples of morally-motivated violence, since religion and morality often hinder violence and promote grace and reconciliation, it seems that a decreased sense of morality would create other problems.

Is religious violence nonexistent or ubiquitous? Because humans are meaning makers and meaning seekers, ⁴⁴ because ‘religion’ and sacred texts help in the process of interpreting reality and because warfare is an event that compels interpretation, ⁴⁵ justifying or describing conflict through one’s worldview is normative. This is not to say that this killing is right or inevitable. Individual humans are able to apply sacred texts and beliefs in astonishing ways – to the benefit or detriment of humanity. There is some level of ambiguity in the relationship between religion and violence. ⁴⁶ It is human actors who, on their own or through the influence of others, interact with their texts, history and beliefs and come to the conclusion that, in their circumstance, killing or maiming is justified.

Hermeneutics and Violence

Hermeneutics is a term used to describe how humans interact with their sacred text. This typically involves some form of methodology or theory. Interpretive traditions are often rich and have a long history. People form beliefs about the correct interpretation (orthodoxy) and the correct application of texts (orthopraxy). Within Christian history we should expect both continuity and discontinuity in the way that Christians across time and space interpret conflict. Rather than be surprised at continuities in language between Constantine, the Crusades, Puritans and the modern War on Terror, similarities in language should be expected given a shared sacred text, symbols and tradition. There are also significant discontinuities in the way that Christians across time have interpreted and articulated God’s relationship to their conflict. Likewise, continuity and variation exist in other theological traditions.

Part of the difficulty in explaining violence in the name of God stems from the complex relationship between a text and killing supported through that text. Why is it that some are motivated to commit violence and the majority are not? Phillip Jenkins comments:

If Scripture passage X supposedly inspired terrorist group Y, then we need to explain why militants chose to draw on that Scripture and not some radically contradictory text. No less important, we must understand why that same Scripture has had no effect whatever in pushing millions of others toward comparably extreme acts. Some of what we call ‘religious violence’ may well be authentically religious in character, but we must find its origins in places other than the basic texts of the faith. ⁴⁷

There is no straight line between beliefs, texts and violence. Most texts, regardless of content, can be used to support killing. For example:

The medieval Crusader should be ‘a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable to God’ (Rom 12:1). ⁴⁸

The Noahic covenant (Gen 9:16–17) on a radical Reformation battle flag in Müntzer. ⁴⁹

God ‘delights by weak things to confound the mighty’ (I Cor 1:27) in the English Civil War. ⁵⁰

‘If God is with us, who can be against us?’ (Rom 8:31) on an English Civil War battle flag. ⁵¹

‘I am the light of the world’ (John 8:12) on modern United States military scopes. ⁵²

These non-military verses are infused with martial meaning. David Martin refers to a similar phenomenon as a migration of meaning. ⁵³ The ‘symbolic logic of Christianity … is transformed under social pressure’. ⁵⁴

It does not follow that texts are entirely passive and bend under the will of the interpreter. Eric Nelson helpfully illustrates the complex relationship between text and reader:

[We] must navigate between two simplistic pictures of how authoritative sources operate in the history of ideas. According to the first, texts do all the work: intellectual history should be regarded as a kind of ballistic display in which thinkers at rest are set in motion by collisions with newly discovered sources. On this view, readers bring very little to the table; they are empty vessels waiting to be filled by the arguments they read. According to the second picture, in contrast, texts do none of the work. They are, rather, deployed instrumentally by readers whose ideological commitments are to be regarded as fully formed in advance—shaped perhaps by their political circumstances, economic situation, or psychological profile. ⁵⁵

Reader and text influence each other.

In addition to the complex relationship between a text and violence supported through it, the same text might lead adherents from the same tradition into radically different actions. For example, submission to authority and rebellion against that same authority could both be supported by an appeal to Romans 13:1–4. The submissive person might note what authority is – ordained by God. The rebel might focus on what legitimate authority is for – ordained by God for the purpose of approving of right actions and punishing wrong ones.

Each article in this volume examines the relationship between beliefs, historical circumstances and particular acts of life-taking. The article by Colin Chapman considers how one should respond to violence done in the name of Islam. He argues for a careful and complex understanding of Islamic beliefs and practices–shedding light on why certain forms of political Islam are currently showing a more violent face. John Coffey’s article reflects on how one should interact with violence in their own faith tradition? Christians, he argues, should acknowledge the darker moments in church history, situate these events within an informed reading of the past and examine historical failings against scripture. Robert Evans focuses on the dynamic beliefs about God and warfare in the Carolingian Empire in western Europe (c.700–900). He shows how the experience of warfare shaped theological interpretations and how these interpretations shaped the perception of warfare. In a culture defined by Christianity and military strength and expansion, theological explanations of war were often deeply pastoral. The article by Helen Nambalirwa Nkabala centres on the interpretation of the Ten Commandments by the Lord’s Resistance Army in Uganda (1987–present). Drawing on extensive first hand interviews with former soldiers, she endeavours to explain how they formed some of their beliefs about what obedience to God’s word entails. She closes her article with a question: ‘Since the LRA’s main ideology was supported by a particular reading of scripture, how can biblical scholars and theologians safeguard against the harmful application of these texts?’ The article by Matthew Rowley puts forward an approach that uses the Bible to deconstruct harmful beliefs that are based on. Bridging historical and biblical studies, this article explains part of the process whereby Christians form beliefs about the righteousness of their killing and then suggests ways of deconstructing this belief from within their worldview.

What is Violence?

There are many definitions of violence. ⁵⁶ Narrowly defined, violence only occurs when a body is physically injured. The most severe form results in dismemberment or death. Without denying other forms, narrow definitions restrict what is and is not violent, often focusing on the objective nature of violence. On the other end of the spectrum, a broad array of behaviour is classified as violent. It could result from an act or from a failure to act. Violence can also be psychological, theological, legal, systemic, economic, linguistic, sexual and emotional – even when no physical mark has been left. Recent studies on ‘microaggression’ have emphasised the seemingly insignificant ways one can, intentionally or unintentionally, harm another. ⁵⁷ Violence can also take the form of threat (often a perceived threat) or intimidation. In these cases, violence is also defined subjectively. There are benefits and drawbacks to both definitions. Due to the subject matter, the authors in this volume generally adhere to a narrower definition – focusing on coercion, mutilation and killing in warfare.

In addition to the debate over what violence is, scholars disagree over who or what can be object – the environment, animals, sacred space, a foetus. In the past, similar debates raged over the full humanity of Jews, Africans and Native Americans. Words like ‘kaffir’, with its original connotations of ‘unbeliever’, developed racist meanings in southern Africa. Language is important to killing, as life-taking is often supported through what Rachael MacNair calls ‘semantic dehumanization’. A ‘linguistic war’ is waged and people are described as either ‘non-persons’, a ‘waste product’ or some form of a ‘disease’. ⁵⁸ Some influential authors recently argued that modern crime in the United States declined, in part, because abortions increased – a proposition they acknowledge is controversial because, among other things, many consider abortion itself to be violent. ⁵⁹ Similarly, as Stephen Pinker admits, his central argument that human sensibilities are progressing and violence is declining can only hold water if certain forms of life-taking are not considered. ⁶⁰

Also, some might question whether ‘killing’ should be used instead of ‘violence’. This is because, generally speaking, people do not refer to their own acts of killing as violence. ‘Violence’ implies that the act of killing is unjust. This need not be the case. There are value-neutral ways of using the term, as employed by some authors in this volume.

The Christian’s relationship with the sword has been controversial since the early church. ⁶¹ Many authors argue that the first three centuries of Christian history are proof that violence was not an acceptable expression of obedience to Jesus. ⁶² When Constantine united church and state, Rome became more humane and the church became more violent. ⁶³ In regard to involvement in Roman wars, there is disagreement over whether or not there is a normative Christian opinion. ‘A number of scholars … have argued that the early church in the first three centuries was predominantly opposed to Christian participation in war’. ⁶⁴ Among these scholars are Roland Bainton, John Cadoux and John Howard Yoder. ⁶⁵ For others, like Peter J Leithart and Darrell Cole, there was more diversity among Christian opinions about involvement in war before Constantine. ⁶⁶ They argue that the pacifist position was a vocal and prolific minority. Though there were only a few soldiers in the second and third centuries, these scholars give evidence that their numbers were increasing.

Historically, Christians have tried to distinguish between the just and unjust use of force. Post-Constantine Christianity adopted and developed a theory of military ethics often called Just War Theory. Augustine (354–430) and Aquinas (1225–1274) are the foremost thinkers. ⁶⁷ Erasmus of Rotterdam (c.1469–1536) – who had much to say against Christian killing – notes that Augustine ‘approved of war in one or two passages’, but ‘how many passages are there where they condemn and curse it?’. ⁶⁸ Christian princes, he skeptically contends, who are searching for a just cause will likely find one and then use a partial reading of scripture and Augustine to further their aims.

Criteria developed regarding when a war was justified (Jus ad bellum) and when conduct in war was just (Jus in bello). More recently an emphasis has also been placed on justice after war (Jus post bellum). Within the Christian strand of this tradition there is an interplay between the interpretation of the biblical text and the messy reality of a world filled with aggressors who will not be pacified without resistance. One modern defender of Just War Theory, Nigel Biggar, not only regrets the evil inherent in war, but also counters those who facilitate evil by refusing to deter force with force. ‘To kill a person is always to cause an evil, but it is not always to do a wrong. History is sometimes very unkind to us and forces us into the position of not being able to do anything without becoming responsible—in some sense—for causing evil’ through action or inaction. ⁶⁹ His work is one attempt to reconcile Christianity with the reality of undesired conflict. Other faith traditions have also developed ways of limiting war and promoting human dignity. ⁷⁰

Conclusion

The articles in this special issue explore how people have interacted with their sacred texts in conflict situations. A number of themes emerge through the articles. The chronological and geographical span of the sum of these articles presents us with the global longue durée of religious history and its association with violence. It is a reminder to missiologists, if one were necessary, that hermeneutics of violence are not a recent phenomenon. It also stands as a call for helpful comparative work from different times and places that analyses the situations under which sacred texts have been used to facilitate violence. We conclude by enumerating significant themes from the articles and suggesting directions for further reflection.

The relationship between sacred texts and violence is complicated. For missiologists seeking transformation and addressing issues of justice and reconciliation few subjects so demand our attention and require our careful thought.