The Word Of God Versus The Totalitarian State

By R. B. Kuiper

Westminster Theological Seminary, Philadelphia.

DURING the first world war the American people were made to believe that the purpose of that conflict was “to make the world safe for democracy”. However, in the wake of victory came numerous dictatorships and totalitarian governments. In the second world war totalitarian Italy, Germany and Japan went down to crushing defeat, but totalitarian Russia rose to incomparably greater heights of power and influence than it had previously enjoyed. Octopus-like it has thrown its tentacles about much of Asia and Europe, and it threatens to draw within its grasp the greater part of the world. In addition to that grand triumph, state totalitarianism has scored several minor victories. In almost every country on the face of the globe there now exists a communist group that is both vocal and influential. Hardly had one form of socialism been defeated in Germany when another took control in Britain. And even in these United States of America, which were founded less than two hundred years ago on the principle that human government must be severely restricted, the power of the federal government has in recent decades grown by leaps and bounds. What the future holds is admittedly difficult to say, but of one thing we can be altogether certain — it is of the essence of totalitarian communism to force itself upon the whole of humanity, and it cannot and will not rest so long as it has not accomplished precisely that.

There is an easy explanation of the present ascendancy of state totalitarianism. It is said to be due to a rather natural human reaction to economic depression. In the closing years of the Roman republic there was such a depression. The people clamored for panem et circenses: literally translated, bread and circuses; in modern paraphrase, a full dinner-pail and the movies. For these things they were more than willing to exchange their liberties. Inevitably the totalitarian Roman empire ensued. Today history is simply repeating itself. In 1929 came a financial crash which ushered in a prolonged depression. Once more men were willing to sell their birthright of liberty for a literal mess of pottage. If only a man gets a big pay-check at the end of each week, why should he worry about the growing power of his government? If ever increasing power of government is conducive to his economic security, more power to it!

It cannot be denied that this explanation contains much more than a modicum of truth. Materialism and a concomitant neglect of spiritual values have induced numerous citizens to surrender at least some of their liberties to the state. And yet these sins are more accurately denominated the occasion than the cause of the ascendancy of state totalitarianism. Underlying them is a more basic evil. At bottom the problem is one of irreligion and false theology.

At a certain juncture in its history the Israelitish people expressed the desire for a king like the kings of the neighboring nations. When the prophet Samuel warned them that a king such as they asked for would certainly play the despot, the people were not dissuaded. And when Samuel complained to Jehovah of the ingratitude of the nation which he had so long and so faithfully served as judge, God made the significant declaration: “They have not rejected thee, but they have rejected me, that I should not reign over them”.[1] On the occasion of the anointing of Saul as Israel’s first king, Samuel echoed those words when he said: “Ye have this day rejected your God, who himself saved you out of all your adversities and your tribulations; and ye have said unto him, Nay, but set a king over us”.[2] The truth thus expressed has a universal application. In this sinful world no nation can get along without human government. But that nation which fears God most, walks in His ways most faithfully, and so honors Him most consistently as its king, has the least need of government by men. Contrariwise, in the measure in which a nation denies the sovereignty of God, in that very measure it is certain to ascribe sovereignty to the men that rule over it. The people that will not have the God of sovereign love reign over it, is bound to accept the rule of despotic men. In a word, the basic cause of state totalitarianism is irreligion.

It was no accident that the totalitarian governments of ancient history were without exception pagan. It was nothing strange that the Napoleonic despotism followed hard upon the French Revolution with its slogan, ni Dieu, ni maître. It was logical that the German people, which had harbored the haughtiest critics of the Word of God and had in considerable numbers embraced false philosophies as, for instance, the nihilism of Nietzsche, should shout in unison, Heil Hitler! That heathen Japan should have presented an almost perfect example of the totalitarian state is precisely as might be expected. It is just as natural that the Russian people, whose Christianity has long been characterized by such abysmal ignorance and hollow formalism as to merit the name semi-paganism, should fall victim to communist totalitarianism. Marxian communism demands a totalitarian state for the very reason that it is blatantly atheistic.

No more urgent issue confronts the world today than that of the totalitarian state. Because this issue is theological, it is more than time that it be regarded in the light of Holy Scripture. It is to the discredit of the Christian church, particularly in America, that it has but feebly attempted to do this. Here is a striking instance of neglect by the church of the social implications of the gospel of Jesus Christ. At this point, as indeed at many others, the church has failed almost completely to do justice to the Diesseitigkeit of its God-given message. Modernism has paid some attention to the totalitarian state, but hardly from the viewpoint of the inspired Word of God. For that reason it has on the whole dealt far too gently with this evil, particularly with communism. Fundamentalism has condemned communism and has berated the Federal Council of the Churches of Christ in America for its leanings toward collectivism, but it has been handicapped by its strong aversion from any sort of social gospel. Roman Catholicism has done fully as well as American Protestantism, but its attacks on the totalitarian state have been vitiated to a considerable extent by its passion for a totalitarian church and by the inconsistency of dealing much less severely with fascism than with communism. Karl Barth has lifted up his voice in protest against the totalitarian state but can hardly be said to have attempted a comprehensive study of the subject. Dutch Calvinism has perhaps done best of all. Over a period of several decades it has produced a number of valuable books on the Christian conception of the state, and its periodical Antirevolutionaire Staatkunde has presented much worth-while material on that theme; but not even those studies have dealt as specifically or thoroughly with the problem of the totalitarian state as present conditions in the world demand. The same may be said of the first volume of H. Henry Meeter’s Calvinism, An Interpretation of Its Basic Ideas, a 1939 American publication on the Calvinistic conception of politics. In fairness to all concerned it should, of course, be borne in mind that state totalitarianism has but recently come to occupy the limelight.

Because of this status of the problem the present attempt to view the totalitarian state in the light of the Word of God will, no doubt, prove far from exhaustive. Perhaps little more will be accomplished in this study than to present an introduction to our theme. But even that will be better than to sit idly by.

I. The Function of Government

An exact delimitation of the proper task of the state is difficult to give. Whether it can be given on the basis of Holy Scripture is problematical and even doubtful. It seems certain that general revelation in nature and history, as well as special revelation in the Bible, must be consulted by one who attempts a precise circumscription of the function of human government. It is not at all certain that God intended that the Bible should say the last word on the subject. Holy Writ is not a text-book of statecraft or jurisprudence. However, there are certain Scriptural data that bear significantly on this matter.

In orthodox circles the view has long been prevalent that the state owes its founding to the presence of sin in the world. That sin was indeed a potent factor in the origination of human government cannot be denied. Possibly the first Scriptural reference to the state is contained in the divine ordinance: “Whoso sheddeth man’s blood, by man shall his blood be shed”.[3] It seems more likely that God intended that ordinance to be upheld by some constituted authority than that He meant it to be executed by individuals in random fashion. If that reference to human government be veiled at best and dubious at worst, elsewhere Scripture teaches unmistakably that the fact of sin has rendered the state necessary. In his classical exhortation to loyalty to the state the apostle Paul says that the civil ruler “beareth not the sword in vain: for he is the minister of God, a revenger to execute wrath upon him that doeth evil”.[4] Whether it follows that some sort of state would not have been instituted if sin had not entered the world, is a question that must be deemed both speculative and debatable. But the conclusion is certainly warranted that God founded the historic state, the actual state in human history, primarily for the purpose of holding sin in check.

It does not necessarily follow, as has sometimes been asseverated, that the function of the state is purely negative. Romans 13 contains more than an inkling that its task has a positive aspect. Speaking of the civil magistrate, Paul exhorts believers: “Do that which is good, and thou shalt have praise of the same: for he is the minister of God to thee for good.”[5] This can only mean that it is the business of the state, not only to prevent crime and to punish criminals, but also to encourage citizens in the doing of good. The fact that the need of such encouragement stems from sin does not alter its positive character.

The teaching of Scripture on the function of the state can best be summarized in the statement that the state is to operate in the sphere of justice. That links up its task with sin, for in a sinless world justice would naturally reign supreme, so that provision for its maintenance would be superfluous.

That ascribes to the state a task which is both highly important and truly colossal, for in this sin-cursed world injustice abounds and the propensity of men to injustice is at once universal and well-nigh irrepressible. That provides for both a positive and a negative aspect of the task of human government, for justice demands not only the punishment of those who do evil but also the reward of those who do good. That makes room for international as well as intranational activities of the state, for it must uphold justice not only among its own citizens, but also among nations. And finally, that highly exalts the state, for it makes the state the earthly representative of the God of perfect justice. All in all, the position that it is the business of the state to maintain justice in the dealings of men with one another seems to cover admirably the various aspects of the teaching of Scripture on the function of human government.

Here then is a broad and yet specific Scriptural principle to which human government should give heed and by which it should consider itself bound. The state should be scrupulously careful to restrict itself to the enforcement of justice and to abstain from all activities not bearing directly on the upholding of justice. On the other hand, to the maintenance of justice it should devote itself so diligently that it has neither time nor energy left for anything else. The acceptance of this principle by the state and the consequent devotion of itself both assiduously and exclusively to the cause of justice would, to say the very least, go a long way toward preventing its becoming totalitarian.

Against this conclusion it may be argued that because of the pervasiveness of injustice in the world the task of maintaining justice would necessitate the state’s interfering with all human relations and that therefore the principle just enunciated must itself tend toward state totalitarianism. The answer to that objection is that, while the maintenance of justice is indeed a task of exceedingly wide scope, it by no means embraces the whole of human life. Men have a great many other interests than that of being dealt with justly. The pursuit of happiness, for instance, whether temporal or eternal, which is natural for man as constituted by the Creator and therefore a universal human interest, comprehends much more than the mere getting of a square deal. It is also an inalienable right of man of which no government may seek to deprive him and with the exercise of which the government may interfere only when one man tramples on the rights of others. It follows that a stronger conclusion than the one objected to is warranted. Strict observance by the state of the principle that it is to operate only in the field of justice would make the avoidance of totalitarianism not merely a likelihood, but a certainty.

Fortunately, a detailed application of this principle and a listing in minutiae of all that is and all that is not the function of the state is not necessary for our present purpose. If the Bible did contain such a catalogue, our problem would indeed vanish forthwith. But its absence from the Bible does not preclude the possibility of dealing with the problem of state totalitarianism on a Scriptural basis. Even though Scripture does not tell to the smallest detail what the state must do and what it may not do, the distinct possibility remains that it clearly forbids the state to do certain specific things. Nor is it at all difficult to envisage the possibility that Scripture may, in the very interest of justice, place restrictions on the state’s activities. That these possibilities in the abstract are in fact realities will be shown presently

II. The Nature of Man

The Word of God humiliates man exceedingly. It describes fallen man as totally depraved. “God saw”, we are told, “that every imagination of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually”.[6] Jeremiah describes the heart of man as “deceitful above all things and desperately wicked”.[7] Paul says that Jew and gentile alike are under sin, and to both he applies the Old Testament quotation: “They are all gone out of the way, they are together become unprofitable; there is none that doeth good, no, not one. Their throat is an open sepulchre; with their tongues they have used deceit; the poison of asps is under their lips; whose mouth is full of cursing and bitterness: their feet are swift to shed blood; destruction and misery are in their ways”.[8] According to Scripture nothing in man has escaped the ravages of sin and his dominant disposition is to hate God and his fellows.[9] The credit for whatever relative good natural, unregenerate, man may do, goes not to any innate goodness of his, which is non-existent, but to the common grace of God.

Strange though it may seem, the Bible also exalts man exceedingly. Of all God’s creatures on earth man alone was made in the image of the Creator.[10] And that image, far from being a mere ornament added to man, constituted his very essence. It was the image of God that made him man. It follows that, when he fell into sin and became totally depraved, he did not lose the image of God in its entirety. So long as he continues a human being he will retain certain remnants of the image of God, such as rationality, morality or conscience, and immortality. Small wonder that the Psalmist should sing this ode to man: “Thou hast made him a little lower than the angels and hast crowned him with glory and honor. Thou madest him to have dominion over the works of thy hands; thou hast put all things under his feet”.[11] Nor is that all. By virtue of the image of God every human being has the semen religionis in his soul. Deep down in every human heart dwells an ineradicable consciousness of the reality of God; men everywhere “feel after God”;[12] and, in the words of the great Augustine, man cannot rest until he rests in God.

From both these aspects of the Scriptural view of man it follows that the totalitarian state cannot be pleasing to God.

No doubt, the institution of the state was intended by God as both a blessing and a curse. What the world would be like without human government is difficult to imagine. Were it not for this restraining force, sin would go on such a rampage as to transform this earth into a veritable hell. The state is an indispensable blessing of the common grace of God. On the other hand, because of the depravity of those who exercise human government it cannot but be evil. To be sure, regenerate man is no longer totally depraved, but neither is he anything like perfect. The most advanced saint still offends in many things and has a long way to go before he shall have apprehended the prize of the high calling of God.[13] Therefore, even at its best human government is certain to be bad. When man sinned against God and by that very act rejected the divine rule, God as it were said to him: “Very well; since you will not have Me to rule over you, you will have to accept the rule of sinful, selfish, corrupt and cruel men. See how you like it”. The institution of the state by God was God’s method of punishing man for his rebellion against Him. In every instance human government is a penalty of sin. And totalitarian rule by a ruthlessly cruel dictator is that penalty in its severest form.

It may not be inferred by any manner of means that totalitarian rule by some monster of iniquity is ever pleasing to God. On the contrary, this can never be anything but an abomination in His sight. Regardless of its relationship to God’s decretive will, it constitutes a flagrant violation of His preceptive will. The same is true, although in lesser degree, of totalitarian rule by a relatively good man, for even good men so-called are bad. The opinion of both Plato and Aristotle that the best form of human government is rule by one, provided the one be good, is lacking in realism. “There is none good but one, that is God.”[14] The simple fact is that no man is good enough to wield unrestricted authority over his fellows and that the best human ruler imaginable is still so evil that he must needs be restrained by some system or other of checks and balances. Only God, who is perfect, is qualified for totalitarian rule. For sinful man to undertake it, is the most presumptuous kind of pride. Harsh though it may sound, the only epithet that describes it adequately is satanic.

In view of the depravity of human rulers the totalitarian state stands condemned. It stands condemned also in view of the fact that those who are ruled bear the image of God.

By virtue of the image of God which he bears, every human being is a prophet, a priest and a king in his own right. To be sure, only regenerate man is in a position to exercise the functions of these offices in their rich Christian denotation and connotation. But even unregenerate man holds these offices after a true fashion. A few of their prerogatives may be specifically named. As prophet, man speaks. It is significant that of all God’s earthly creatures only man has the gift of speech. Every human being has freedom of speech. As priest, man worships. It is meaningful that of all God’s earthly creatures only man has the capacity to worship. Every human being has freedom of worship. As king, man rules. Immediately after creating man God commanded him to “subdue” the earth and He gave him “dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over every living thing that moveth upon the earth”.[15] Every human being has the right to hold private property. The prohibition “Thou shalt not steal”,[16] the story of the seizure of Naboth’s vineyard by king Ahab and the violent divine indignation aroused by that wanton deed,[17] and Peter’s words addressed to Ananias with reference to the land which the latter had sold: “While it remained, was it not thine own? And after it was sold, was it not in thine own power?”[18] are a few of the Scripture passages that support the right of private property; but the most compelling Scriptural proof of that right is the teaching that man is God’s image-bearer. What is a king without a domain?

That these rights have their proper limits should go without saying. In relation to God they are severely restricted. Man may speak only that which is pleasing to God. Man may worship only according to the prescriptions of the Word of God. Man may hold private property only as a steward of God. In relation to men, too, these rights have bounds. In exercising them each man must have due regard for the rights of others. To insist that this be done is one of the obvious functions of the state, for it is essential to the maintenance of justice.

However, what needs to be emphasized at this juncture is that it was God who endowed man with these rights at the very moment of his creation. The rather prevalent notion that the individual citizen possesses these rights because the state has graciously bestowed them upon him is utterly erroneous. He has them, not by the grace of his government, but by the grace of God. Specifically, an American citizen has freedom of speech, freedom of worship, and the right to hold private property, not because the constitution of the nation grants him these, but conversely, the constitution recognizes these prerogatives of the citizen because God has bestowed them upon him. For that reason these prerogatives are “inalienable”. No man, no ruler, no government can deprive him of them. In case the state forbids their exercise, he is still in full possession of them. So long as man bears the image of God, so long as he is a human being, he continues in their possession.

Not even that is the entire picture. At this point the state becomes servant to the citizen. It is the God-assigned duty of the government to protect the individual in the exercise of these God-given privileges. This is an obvious demand of justice.

All of that is either expressed or implied in our American Bill of Rights, which was added to our constitution almost at once after its adoption because many of the founders of this republic felt that the constitution was not sufficiently specific in defining the rights of the citizen. Thus regarded, the Bill of Rights is indeed an eminently Scriptural document.

The principle that men may govern only with the consent of those whom they govern is patently Scriptural. It is supported by certain events in Bible history. After Saul, Israel’s first king, had been anointed by Samuel, he was chosen king — by lot, to be sure — at a gathering of the people.[19] Although David had been anointed several years before, he did not actually reign until he was invited to the kingship, first by the tribe of Judah, and subsequently by the remaining tribes of Israel.[20] However, the strongest and most conclusive support for this principle is found in the Scriptural teaching of man’s creation in the image of God. The image of God lends to man such dignity and glory that no one save God stands above him. That man who arrogates to himself rule over his fellow-men without their consent flouts that dignity and that glory and puts himself in the place of God.

The case against the totalitarian state is far stronger even than that. Not only does no government have the right to exercise rule over a people without its consent. It is also true that no people has the right to consent to totalitarian rule. In several instances in the course of history whole nations have welcomed a totalitarian government. That the great mass of the Japanese people long did that very thing is beyond dispute. That the vast majority of the German people recently did likewise can hardly be questioned. But thus men despise and sell their birthright of the image of God. That most certainly may never be done. The conclusion is inescapable that totalitarian rule, even with the consent of the governed, is an abomination.

III. The Autonomy of Spheres

The life of mankind may be said to consist of several spheres which, although interdependent and inseparable, are distinct from each other. How many of these spheres exist, whether three or seven or more, is indeed an important question, but for the present purpose is not of supreme importance. What is of supreme importance is that the autonomy of at feast certain of these spheres be upheld.

There are in the world three institutions concerning which Scripture teaches unmistakably that they are of divine origin. They are the family, the church and the state. The Lord God created woman and brought her to the man that she might be his wife.[21] Blessing them He said: “Be fruitful and multiply, and replenish the earth”.[22] Thus God instituted the human family. God also instituted the church. He brought it into being in embryonic form when He said to the serpent in the garden of Eden: “I will put enmity between thee and the woman, and between thy seed and her seed; it shall bruise thy head, and thou shalt bruise his heel”.[23] He established it in more formal fashion when He spoke to Abram: “I will establish my covenant between me and thee and thy seed after thee in their generations for an everlasting covenant, to be a God unto thee and to thy seed after thee”.[24] And referring specifically to the New Testament aspect of the church, the Son of God declared: “Upon this rock I will build my church”.[25] Likewise it was God who instituted the state. When Pontius Pilate, the Roman procurator of Judaea, said to Jesus: “Knowest thou not that I have power to crucify thee, and have power to release thee?” the Lord did not deny that power but replied: “Thou couldest have no power at all against me, except it were given thee from above”.[26] And speaking of “the higher powers”, Paul said: “There is no power but of God; the powers that be are ordained of God. Whosoever therefore resisteth the power, resisteth the ordinance of God”.[27]

If it was God who instituted the family and the church, it was not the state. It is an interesting and highly significant detail that both the family and the church are older than the state. The state cannot possibly have instituted them. Genesis 1 relates the founding of the family, in the garden of Eden before the fall of man into sin. Genesis 3 tells of the founding of the church, also in Eden, but immediately after the fall. As was already indicated, the first possible Scriptural reference to the state is contained in Genesis 9, which narrates events that occurred after the flood. It follows that the family and the church do not exist by the grace of the state but by the grace of God, and that He bestowed upon the family and the church certain prerogatives of which the state may never presume to deprive them. The state, to be sure, is autonomous in its sphere, but so is the family autonomous in its sphere, and likewise the church in its. Souvereiniteit in eigen kring, a phrase popularized by the Dutch theologian and statesman Abraham Kuyper, expresses a teaching of Scripture which is meaningful indeed.

Because the life of the individual and the life of the race are organic, the various spheres which they comprise cannot be isolated from one another but are certain to touch each other. That fact often renders the practical application of the principle of the autonomy of spheres extremely difficult. Who dares to assert, for instance, that he is prepared to say the last word on the implications of the separation of church and state? However, difficulties of application in no way detract from the validity of the principle under discussion. It is also true that numerous applications may be made without hesitation.

That children belong to their parents and not primarily to the state may be set down as a teaching of the Word of God without any fear of successful contradiction. Therefore Scripture charges parents, not the state, with the education of their children. The Bible literally teems with commands addressed to parents to be diligent in the performance of that task, and, as might be expected, it insists that the education which they provide be permeated with religion, for the fear of the Lord is the beginning of both knowledge and wisdom.[28] Two particularly noteworthy passages may be singled out — one from the Old Testament, the other from the New. Moses expressed himself emphatically on the subject when he said to Israel: “These words which I command thee this day shall be in thine heart; and thou shalt teach them diligently unto thy children, and shalt talk of them when thou sittest in thine house, and when thou walkest by the way, and when thou liest down, and when thou risest up. And thou shalt bind them for a sign upon thine hand, and they shall be as frontlets between thine eyes. And thou shalt write them upon the posts of thy house and on thy gates”.[29] And Paul issued the forthright command: “Ye fathers, provoke not your children to wrath, but bring them up in the nurture and admonition of the Lord”.[30]

Does it follow that the state has nothing to say about the education of children? Certainly not. Because of the inroads of sin on this domain of life, it is often compelled to act. If the state did not enact any compulsory education laws, many children would receive no education. Nor may it permit children who attend school to be exposed to the dangers of unsanitary conditions or of buildings that are veritable fire-traps. In a word, the state must see to it that justice is done to children in the realm of education.

Regarding the precise task of the state in the matter of education there are, no doubt, problems that remain to be solved. However, one truth at the very least stands out unassailable. It is the right of parents, not the state, to decide what religious education children are to receive. The provision of the constitution of Soviet Russia forbidding the giving of religious education flies in the face of the Word of God. When, on the other hand, three decades ago, the Supreme Court of the United States of America declared unconstitutional a law enacted by the State of Oregon compelling all the children in that commonwealth to attend the so-called religiously neutral public schools, it occupied Scriptural ground, whether or not it was aware of that fact. And when, in 1921, a similar law was proposed in the State of Michigan and, having been submitted to the voters by way of a referendum, was overwhelmingly defeated, the people of that commonwealth, whatever their motives may have been, arrived at a Scriptural conclusion. Again, for the recent decision of our highest court in the McCollum-Champaign case there is at least this to be said that it is both good Americanism and good Christianity to insist that the civil government has no right to bring pressure to bear on parents to expose their children to any specific kind of religious education, or for that matter to any religious education at all. What seems strange, however, is that so few of the Christian people in our land seem to be aware of an obvious and far-reaching implication of that decision. If religious instruction given on a voluntary basis, not by the public schools but by the churches of a community, yet in the public school buildings and within what are usually regarded as school hours, violates the rights of atheists, then a fortiori the teaching of naturalism and materialism, with their inescapable atheistic implications, by the public schools themselves in classes which the children of believers are required to attend does the greatest violence to the rights of Christians.

Beyond the shadow of a doubt, in the matter of the religious education of children the family is sovereign, not the state. And since it is the plain teaching of Holy Scripture that religion must suffuse the whole of education, Christian parents must ever insist on their God-given right to provide for their children an education that is Christian throughout. Never may the state deny, or even abridge, that right. In fact, the state is in duty bound in the interest of justice to uphold that right. In that respect the state exists for the family.

That Scripture teaches the separation of church and state is beyond dispute.

Under the theocracy, state and church were so closely joined together that it is hardly amiss to describe Israel as a church-state. Yet it would be an exaggeration to assert that the two were identical. Significantly, God did not place Moses alone at the head of His people, but alongside of him Aaron the high-priest. In the days of the kings there were frequent clashes between them on the one hand and the priests or the prophets on the other. In a real sense these were clashes between state and church. For instance, the prophet Nathan did not hesitate to rebuke king David in the matter of Bathsheba and Uriah;[31] the prophet Elijah on more than one occasion violently assailed king Ahab;[32] and when queen Athaliah sought to destroy all the seed royal, the priest Jehoiada with the aid of his wife rescued the child Joash, kept him in hiding, and in due time anointed him to be king over Judah.[33] Two kings were severely punished directly by God Himself for violating the principle of the separation of church and state. When king Saul, ready to join battle with the Philistines, himself offered up a burnt-offering instead of waiting for Samuel to arrive for the performance of that rite, God rejected him as king.[34] And when king Uzziah, otherwise God-fearing, presumptuously entered the temple to burn incense upon the altar of incense, the Lord smote him forthwith with leprosy from which he never recovered, and his son Jotham reigned in his stead.[35]

The separation of church and state is taught progressively in Holy Scripture. Therefore, it is more patently taught in the New Testament than in the Old. The Lord Jesus stated it unequivocally when, in answer to the question whether it was lawful to give tribute to a pagan ruler, He said: “Render unto Caesar the things that are Caesar’s, and unto God the things that are God’s”.[36] Here Jesus, to quote from Calvin’s commentaries in loco, “lays down a clear distinction between spiritual and civil governments”. The completion of the separation of church and state was implied in Christ’s command to the church to preach the gospel in the whole world and to make disciples of all nations,[37] and it actually came to pass with the outpouring of the Holy Spirit upon the church on the day of Pentecost. Cloven tongues as of fire sat on the heads of the disciples. They began to speak in many tongues. Men were present from all over the Mediterranean world. Each of them heard the gospel preached in the language in which he was born. Three thousand were converted and received by baptism into the Christian church.[38] That stupendous event marks the greatest turning-point in the history of the church. It had, by and large, been bound up — albeit never identified — with Israel as a nation; now it blossomed forth into universalism. Henceforth a national church was not merely an anachronism but a contradiction in terms. The church of Jesus Christ is neither national nor yet international. It is supra-national. It far transcends all nationalism. And that fact spells the consummation of the separation of church and state.

It must be admitted that the church has been slow to grasp this teaching of the Word of God. Augustine, in many respects the greatest of the church fathers, did not see it, nor did the early reformers of the sixteenth century. It did begin to dawn on John Calvin, but even that keen student of the Word of God was not sufficiently far ahead of his times to discern it clearly. Not even the Westminster divines a century later had anything like a profound insight into this truth. In the providence of God it remained for the churches of America in particular to be illuminated on this score by the Spirit of truth. From the time of its founding, and even prior to its founding, this nation has had a multiplicity of Christian denominations. It was but natural that no denomination was willing to have another denomination favored above it by the state. Therefore, unlike many European nations which had their state churches, these United States have from the beginning abounded with free churches. A logical consequence was the separation of church and state. Roger Williams, extremist though he was in some respects, must be credited with having been among the first to insist on this separation. Gradually, nay rapidly, the teaching of Scripture on this matter gained general acceptance. In 1788 the General Synod of the Presbyterian Church amended section III of chapter XXIII of the Westminster Confession of Faith to read as follows: “Civil magistrates may not assume to themselves the administration of the Word and Sacraments; or the power of the keys of the kingdom of heaven; or, in the least, interfere in matters of faith. Yet, as nursing fathers, it is the duty of civil magistrates to protect the Church of our common Lord, without giving the preference to any denomination of Christians above the rest, in such a manner that all ecclesiastical persons whatever shall enjoy the full, free, and unquestioned liberty of discharging every part of their sacred functions, without violence or danger. And, as Jesus Christ hath appointed a regular government and discipline in his Church, no law of any commonwealth should interfere with, let, or hinder, the due exercise thereof, among the voluntary members of any denomination of Christians, according to their own profession and belief. It is the duty of civil magistrates to protect the person and good name of all their people, in such an effectual manner as that no person be suffered, either upon pretence of religion or of infidelity, to offer any indignity, violence, abuse, or injury to any other person whatsoever: and to take order, that all religious and ecclesiastical assemblies be held without molestation or disturbance”.

Admittedly the term separation of church and state is a loose one. Absolute separation of the two is obviously out of the question. It must also be granted that in practice the proper application of the principle denominated by that term is often difficult to determine. Many thorny questions remain here. Yet three truths stated in the above quotation from the Presbyterian Confession of Faith may without hesitation be called unassailable. The first is that the state has nothing to say about the spiritual affairs of the church of Jesus Christ. It may not assume to itself “the administration of the Word and Sacraments; or the power of the keys of the kingdom of heaven; or, in the least, interfere in matters of faith”. The second is, that no state has the right to enact for the church laws which conflict with the laws laid down by Christ for His church, and that it is the prerogative of the church to judge what are Christ’s laws for it. The third is that it is the solemn duty of the state to protect the church, as well as every citizen, in the “full, free, and unquestioned liberty” of exercising religion. In this important respect the state is servant to the church and exists for the church’s benefit. Each of these three truths rules out the totalitarian state.

IV. The Kingship of Christ

The Word of God teaches the mediatorial kingship of Christ, and it strongly emphasizes the totalitarian scope of His rule.

That the second Psalm is Messianic permits of no doubt. Handel was right when he interpreted it thus in his famous oratorio The Messiah, for the early Christians at Jerusalem so interpreted it in the prayer which they offered to God in the day of persecution. Quoting from this Psalm they addressed God: “Who by the mouth of thy servant David hast said, Why did the heathen rage and the people imagine vain things? The kings of the earth stood up, and the rulers were gathered together against the Lord and against his anointed”. Identifying Christ with the Lord’s anointed, they went on to say: “For of a truth against thy holy child Jesus, whom thou hast anointed, both Herod and Pontius Pilate, with the gentiles and the people of Israel were gathered together”.[39] Now to this anointed Son of God the Psalm ascribes totalitarian rule when it says: “Yet have I set my king upon my holy hill of Zion. I will declare the decree: the Lord hath said unto me, Thou art my Son; this day have I begotten thee. Ask of me, and I will give thee the heathen for thine inheritance and the uttermost parts of the earth for thy possession”.[40] Of the suffering servant of Jehovah Isaiah says: “When thou shalt make his soul an offering for sin, he shall see his seed, he shall prolong his days, and the pleasure of the Lord shall prosper in his hand. He shall see of the travail of his soul and shall be satisfied: by his knowledge shall my righteous servant justify many; for he shall bear their iniquities. Therefore will I divide him a portion with the great, and he shall divide the spoil with the strong; because he hath poured out his soul unto death, and he was numbered with the transgressors; and he bare the sin of many, and made intercession for the transgressors”.[41] When the risen Christ gave the great commission to His eleven disciples on a mountain in Galilee, He declared majestically: “All power is given unto me in heaven and in earth”.[42] Paul wrote to the church at Ephesus that God raised Christ from the dead “and set him at his own right hand in the heavenly places, far above all principalities and power and might and dominion and every name that is named, not only in this world but also in that which is to come: and hath put all things under his feet, and gave him to be the head over all things to the church”.[43] The same apostle told the Philippian Christians: “God also hath highly exalted him and gave him a name which is above every name; that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, of things in heaven and things in earth and things under the earth; and that every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father”.[44] To the seven churches in Asia Minor, John described the glorified Christ as “the prince of the kings of the earth”.[45]

According to Scripture the God-man, the Saviour, the Mediator, having passed through the state of humiliation, is now exalted to the right hand of God and from there exercises totalitarian rule over the universe. He has boundless authority over the church and the world; over mankind as a whole and each individual; over every sphere of human life: the family, the church, the state and whatever other spheres may exist; over politics, both national and international; over labor and industry; over science and art; over all.

Sad to say, much of Christendom is blind, or nearly so, to the Scriptural emphasis on the present kingship of Christ. Historic Lutheranism, from the Protestant Reformation to the present day, has stressed Christ’s saviourhood rather than His kingship. It is characteristic of Fundamentalism to do likewise. The usual Fundamentalist is diligent in urging sinners to accept Christ as their personal Saviour, but he seldom tells them that they cannot possibly receive Christ as Saviour without at once acknowledging Him as king. The modern Dispensationalist goes so far as to say that Satan is in control of this present world. He overlooks the obvious fact that the only three passages of Scripture which denominate Satan “the prince of this world” assert that Christ by His death defeated Satan as prince of the world. With a view to His impending death Jesus said: “Now shall the prince of this world be cast out”;[46] “the prince of this world cometh, and hath nothing in me”;[47] “the prince of this world is judged”.[48] Karl Barth has insisted that it is folly to say that the kingdom is now present. According to him, Scripture teaches only that the kingdom has come nigh. Its actual arrival awaits a future crisis.

And Modernism, which is in reality a denial of historic Christianity, while putting considerable emphasis on Christ’s kingship, divorces it from the substitutionary atonement, which according to Scripture constitutes its foundation. God declares in Isaiah: “Therefore will I divide him a portion with the great, and he shall divide the spoil with the strong; because he hath poured out his soul unto death, and he was numbered with the transgressors, and he bare the sin of many”;[49] and, after saying that Christ “became obedient unto death, even the death of the cross”, Paul proceeds: “Wherefore God also hath highly exalted him and given him a name above every name”.[50] By severing Christ’s kingship from its Scriptural foundation Modernism has transformed it into an air-castle. It cannot be denied that the present kingship of Christ is slighted, and even denied, by a great many who profess Christianity. However, this phenomenon is not universal. The Reformed faith has not only always acknowledged the present kingship of Christ, but has ever stressed it strongly, and it does that today.

The neglect of the present totalitarian rule of Christ is regrettable for more reasons than one. One extremely weighty reason is that this teaching of Holy Writ constitutes a potent argument against state totalitarianism. Those who slight this Scriptural doctrine are discarding a compelling argument against the totalitarian state.

The rule of Christ is totalitarian. That truth leaves no room for totalitarian rule by men. When men seek to exercise totalitarian rule, they arrogate to themselves that which belongs to Christ alone. A totalitarian state cannot but collide head-on with the kingdom of Christ. In a word, state totalitarianism is a manifestation of antichrist. There are many antichrists in the world, but none bolder than this.

There can be little doubt that the thirteenth chapter of Revelation describes the kingdom of antichrist as it shall flourish toward the end of time, shortly before Christ returns to cast it down into utter ruin. The human race will be consolidated under the rule of the beast that rises up out of the sea, and his rule will be totalitarian. He will be the acknowledged political head of humanity. It is said that he has “seven heads and ten horns, and upon his horns ten crowns”. The dragon gives him “his power and his seat and great authority”. His followers say: “Who is like unto the beast? Who is able to make war with him?”[51] He will be the acknowledged religious head of humanity. “All that dwell upon the earth shall worship him, whose names are not written in the book of life of the Lamb slain from the foundation of the world”. A second beast, which comes up out of the earth, “causeth the earth and them which dwell therein to worship the first beast”. He tells men “that they should make an image to the beast.. . And he had power to give life unto the image of the beast, that the image of the beast should both speak and cause that as many as would not worship the image of the beast should be killed.”[52] He will also be the acknowledged industrial head of humanity. “All, both small and great, rich and poor, free and bond” will be caused “to receive a mark in their right hand or in their foreheads”, and no man will be permitted to “buy or sell” save he that has “the mark, or the name of the beast, or the number of his name”.[53] Politically, religiously and industrially the beast, who is none other than the antichrist himself, will dominate the human race. His rule will indeed be totalitarian. The conclusion is amply warranted that state totalitarianism is in its very essence antichristian. Every totalitarian state, whether of the past, the present, or the future, is antichrist.

The totalitarian kingship of Christ is an impregnable bulwark against totalitarian rule by men. There cannot be the slightest doubt as to which of the two will prevail in the end. How extremely sad, in the meantime, that of those who should man that bulwark so few are doing it. The Christian people of Germany could not possibly have bowed as they did before Hitler and his associates, if they had been fully conscious of the Scriptural teaching of the kingship of Christ. Evidently the Russian people fell an easy prey to communist totalitarianism because they had little or no conception of the kingship of Christ. On the other hand, it is safe to say that one reason why the Calvinists of little Holland, by and large, refused so persistently and at so great sacrifice to bend the knee before German despotism was that the kingship of Christ was uppermost in their minds. This too is certain — nothing can so effectively roll back the tide of totalitarian communism as the recognition by the peoples of the earth of the totalitarian kingship of the Christ of God as a present reality.

V. The Sovereignty of God

No doctrine looms larger on the pages of Holy Writ that that of the sovereignty of God. The very central teaching of the Bible is that God is God and that He is God alone. It is forcefully expressed in the following passages, together with a host of others. “My counsel shall stand, and I will do all my pleasure.”[54] “He doeth according to his will in the army of heaven and among the inhabitants of the earth: and none can stay his hand or say unto him, What doest thou?”[55] “Therefore hath he mercy on whom he will have mercy, and whom he will he hardeneth. Thou wilt say then unto me, Why doth he yet find fault? For who hath resisted his will? Nay but, O man, who art thou that repliest against God? Shall the thing formed say to him that formed it, Why hast thou made me thus? Hath not the potter power over the clay, of the same lump to make one vessel unto honor and another unto dishonor?”[56] “O the depth of the riches both of the wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable are his judgments, and his ways past finding out! For who hath known the mind of the Lord? Or who hath been his counsellor? Or who hath given to him, and it shall be recompensed unto him again? For of him and through him and to him are all things: to whom be glory forever. Amen.”[57]

A corollary of the sovereignty of God is the thoroughly unpopular and much maligned but indubitably Scriptural doctrine of predestination and election. That the Modernist, who rejects the Bible as the Word of God, should reject this doctrine also, is not difficult to understand; but when a self-styled Bible-believing and Bible-loving Christian denies it, one can hardly help wondering whether he really does believe and love the Word of God. It is taught so clearly and emphatically in Holy Scripture. Paul taught it unequivocally. To the believers at Ephesus he wrote: “Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who hath blessed us with all spiritual blessings in heavenly places in Christ: according as he hath chosen us in him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and without blame before him in love: having predestinated us unto the adoption of children by Jesus Christ to himself, according to the good pleasure of his will, to the praise of the glory of his grace”.[58] Peter taught it just as unmistakably. He addressed the believers to whom he wrote as “elect according to the foreknowledge of God”;[59] he described them as “a chosen generation”;[60] he exhorted them: “Give diligence to make your calling and election sure”;[61] and he informed them that those who stumble at the Word were “appointed” thereunto.[62] The Lord Jesus taught it no less emphatically when He said: “I thank thee, O Father, Lord of heaven and earth, because thou hast hid these things from the wise and prudent, and hast revealed them unto babes”.[63]

It was their unshakable belief in the sovereignty of God and divine election that caused the Calvinists of the Reformation and post-Reformation periods to insist on the equality of men before God and boldly to cast off the yoke of oppressive rulers. Rightly so. If God is the sovereign ruler of men, no man is sovereign over his fellows. Only then does one man have any authority at all over another when it pleases God to lend him authority, and even in that case he is restricted in the exercise of that authority by the ordinances of God’s holy Word. When a human ruler violates these ordinances, it is not merely the privilege of his subjects to oppose him, but such is their solemn duty. Again, the prince and the pauper alike can be saved by grace only. The poorest peasant may be one of God’s elect as well as the most pompous potentate. In fact, it is possible that the potentate may be numbered among the reprobate, whereas it is certain that the believing peasant belongs to the elect. Then why should a cobbler fawn before his king or a ditch-digger before his emperor?

Says John Richard Green in his History of the English People: “What gave its grandeur to the doctrine of Knox was his resolute assertion of a Christian order before which the social and political forces of the world about him shrank into insignificance. The meanest peasant, once called of God, felt within him a strength that was stronger than the might of nobles, and a wisdom that was wiser than the statecraft of kings. In that mighty elevation of the masses, which was embodied in the Calvinist doctrines of election and grace, lay the germs of the modern principles of human equality.” He proceeds: “The fruits of such a teaching soon showed themselves in a new attitude of the people. ‘Here’, said Melville, over the grave of John Knox, ‘here lies one who never feared the face of man’; and if Scotland still reverences the memory of the reformer, it is because at that grave her peasant and her trader learned to look in the face of nobles and kings and ‘not be ashamed’”.[64] After asserting: “It is not too much to say that in the seventeenth century the entire political future of mankind was staked upon the questions that were at issue in England”, John Fiske opines: “Had it not been for the Puritans, political liberty would probably have disappeared from the world. If ever there were men who laid down their lives in the cause of all mankind, it was those grim old Ironsides, whose watch-words were texts of Holy Writ, whose battle-cries were hymns of praise”.[65] Of Calvinistic Holland George Bancroft wrote: “Of all the branches of the Germanic family that nation has endured the most and wrought the most in favor of liberty of conscience, liberty of commerce, and liberty in the State. For three generations the best interests of mankind were abandoned to its keeping; and to uphold the highest objects of spiritual life, its merchants, land holders, and traders so teemed with heroes and martyrs that they tired out brute force, and tyranny, and death itself, and from war educed life and hope for coming ages”.[66] De Tocqueville called Calvinism “a democratic and republican religion”;[67] and Froude said: “Calvinism has inspired and maintained the bravest efforts ever made to break the yoke of unjust authority”.[68] Lord Macaulay is credited with saying of the Puritan: “He bowed himself in the dust before his Maker, but he set his foot on the neck of his king”. The truth is that he set his foot on the neck of his king for the very reason that he bowed himself in the dust before his Maker. Because he upheld the sovereignty of God he could not but rebel against the human ruler who arrogated to himself in any degree the sovereignty which is God’s alone.

The word sovereign — more correctly spelled soveren, the modern spelling being due to a supposed connection with the word reign — is derived from the Latin superlative supremus, which means highest. Obviously there can be but one who is highest. To be sure, historically the term has come to be used in a looser sense. We speak, for example, of the sovereignty of the individual and the sovereignty of the family, of the church, and of the state, each in its own sphere. Although it can hardly be disputed that such terminology is fully justified by usage, the fact may not be overlooked that it reduces sovereignty to something relative. Absolute sovereignty belongs to one alone, and that one is God. The individual, the family, the church and the state are all of them subject to His boundless sovereignty. It follows that the state which in the exercise of power goes beyond the bounds set by God in His Word impinges on the divine sovereignty. The conclusion is also inescapable that the state which assumes unlimited authority over the individual citizen, the family and the church sets itself up as God. The totalitarian state is in its very essence a denial of the divine sovereignty. And that is but another way of saying that state totalitarianism is blasphemy.

It is no accident that many of the notorious dictators of history laid claim to divinity. It was rather the logical consequence of their totalitarianism. The image of gold which Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon, set up in the plain of Dura and for which he demanded the worship of the peoples and nations under his rule may possibly have represented Nebuchadnezzar himself.[69] It is certain that Darius the Mede laid claim to divine honor. He decreed that every man who would ask a petition of any God or man during a period of thirty days save of the king would be cast into the den of lions.[70] The early Roman emperors required the worship of their subjects and persecuted the Christians for refusing to worship them. By decree of the Senate, Gaius Octavius, the first of them, was named Augustus, which means sacred. He had the title Pontifex Maximus, or high-priest, bestowed upon himself. After his death the people erected temples and altars to his memory, and numbered him among the gods. The emperor of Japan long claimed direct descent from Amaterasu, the sun-goddess; and State Shintoism was in reality worship of the state. Patriotism, or loyalty to the state, was until recently the official religion of Japan. Marxian communism is commonly thought to be thoroughly anti-religious. The truth is that it is itself a religion. In their volume The Growth of Religion, Henry Nelson Wieman and Walter M. Horton correctly classify it as a religion. It considers itself the only true religion. Its God is the communist state. For some years a large section of the German people rendered what approached divine honor to Adolf Hitler and regarded his Mein Kampf virtually as their Bible. Even the American people need to be reminded that, while regard, in the interest of justice, for the physical welfare of its citizens surely lies within the province of the state, to guarantee freedom from want and freedom from fear is far beyond the power of human government. Only God, whose providence controls all the events of history comprehensively, can guarantee those freedoms.

The question how the onslaughts of state totalitarianism may be met and thwarted can now be answered.

War cannot do it. This is not to say that war of the democracies on such a totalitarian state as Soviet Russia may not become a necessity or even a duty. But after the defeat of several totalitarian states in the recent war the threat to the world of state totalitarianism is greater than ever. The democracies themselves are more nearly totalitarian today than they were before the war. War cannot destroy an ideology. The power of the Roman Catholic Church cannot do it. Rome is indeed powerful and it is violent in its opposition to communism. But it is zealous for church totalitarianism, which finds no more support in Scripture than does state totalitarianism. Besides, the church which it would make totalitarian is itself a state. Neither can the principles of the French Revolution do it, for history shows abundantly that a proletariat which considers itself sovereign can be every whit as tyrannical as the most autocratic despot.

There is but one answer to this burning question. Only a return to the Word of God by those peoples that were historically Christian and the acceptance of that Word by the other peoples of earth can stem the onrushing tide of state totalitarianism. Nor will a half-hearted, or for that matter an enthusiastic, recognition of some of the teachings of Holy Writ suffice. The nations must tremble at the whole Word of God, even at that truth which is probably the most despised and hated, but certainly the most basic, of all Scriptural teachings — the sovereignty of God.

Notes

1. I Sam. 8:7.
2. I Sam. 10:19.
3. Gen. 9:6.
4. Rom. 13:4.
5. Rom. 13:3, 4.
6. Gen. 6:5.
7. Jer. 17:9.
8. Rom. 3:12–16.
9. Rom. 1:30; Tit. 3:3.
10. Gen. 1:26, 27.
11. Ps. 8:5, 6.
12. Acts 17:27:
13. Jas. 3:2; Phil. 3:12–14.
14. Mark 10:18.
15. Gen. 1:28.
16. Ex. 20:15; Deut. 5:19.
17. I Kings 21.
18. Acts 5:4.
19. I Sam. 10:17–21.
20. II Sam. 2:4; 5:1–3.
21. Gen. 2:21–24.
22. Gen. 1:28.
23. Gen. 3:15.
24. Gen. 17:7.
25. Matt. 16:18.
26. John 19:10, 11.
27. Rom. 13:1, 2.
28. Prov. 1:7; 9:10.
29. Deut. 6:6–9.
30. Eph. 6:4.
31. II Sam. 12.
32. I Kings 18, 21.
33. II Kings 11.
34. I Sam. 13:8–14.
35. II Chron. 26:16–23.
36. Matt. 22:21.
37. Matt. 28:18–20; Luke 24:47; Acts 1:8.
38. Acts 2.
39. Acts 4:25–27.
40. Ps. 2:6–8.
41. Isa. 53:10–12.
42. Matt. 28:18.
43. Eph. 1:20–22.
44. Phil. 2:9–11.
45. Rev. 1:5.
46. John 12:31.
47. John 14:30.
48. John 16:11.
49. Isa. 53:12.
50. Phil. 2:8, 9.
51. Rev. 13:1, 2, 4.
52. Rev. 13:8, 11–14.
53. Rev. 13:16, 17.
54. Isa. 46:10.
55. Dan. 4:35.
56. Rom. 9:18–21.
57. Rom. 11:33–36.
58. Eph. 1:3–6.
59. I Pet. 1:2.
60. I Pet. 2:9.
61. II Pet. 1:10.
62. I Pet. 2:8.
63. Matt. 11:25.
64. Book VII, chapter II.
65. The Beginnings of New England, pp. 37, 51.
66. The History of the United States, vol. X, p. 58.
67. Democracy, vol. I, p. 384.
68. Short Studies on Great Subjects, p. 13.
69. Dan. 3.
70. Dan. 6:1–9.