man might go and drink it; but he argued that the goodwill on the giver’s part indicated by the gift was more important than the possible ill effects to the recipient.
COMMAND OF NON-RESISTANCE 127 beggar for not obeying the prohibition to sit at the gateway. I awaited the grenadier at the gate. When he came up to me I asked him if he could read.
‘ I can, what about it? * ‘ Have you read the Gospels \ 9 ‘I have/ 1 And have you read, “ For I was an hungered, and ye gave me no meat”? * And X quoted that passage. He knew it and listened to it, and I saw that he was uneasy. Two passers-by stopped to listen. It was plain that the grenadier was hurt to feel that he, fulfilling his duty excel- lently and driving beggars away from the place they had to be driven from, sud- denly appeared to be in the wrong. He was agitated, and was evidently seeking a rejoinder. Suddenly in his clever black eyes a light gleamed, and he turned sideways to me as though to walk away. ‘ And have you read the Military Code? A asked he. I said I had not read it.
* ‘ Then don't talk/ said the grenadier, tossing his head triumphantly, and adjusting his coat he proceeded confidently to his post. This was the only man I ever met in all my life who quite logically decided the eternal question with which our social state, being what it is, faced me and faces every man who calls himself a Christian.
O CHAPTER III THE LAW OF GOD AND THE LAW OF MAN It is wrongly said that the Christian teaching relates only, to personal salvation and not to public, political questions. That is merely audacious and barefaced assertion, which is most obviously false and collapses as soon as it is seriously considered. Very well, I will not resist the evil doer, I will turn my cheek as a private individual, say I to myself; but if an enemy comes, or the people are oppressed, and I am called on to take part in the struggle against the evil men, and to go and kill them, then it is imperative for me to decide wherein lies the service of God, and wherein the service of ‘ the vain thing/ Am I to go to the war or j not? I am a peasant, and am chosen to serve as a village elder, a judge, or a juryman, and I am told to take an oath, to judge and to inflict punishment. What am I to do? Again I have to choose between the law of God and the law of man. Or I am a monk, living in a monastery, and some peasants have taken our hay and I am sent to participate in the struggle against | the evil men, and to take legal proceedings i against the peasants. Again I have to choose. No one can escape from the question. I speak j LAW OF GOD AND LAW OF MAN 129 not merely of our class, whose activity consists almost entirely in resisting evil men: in the army, in the courts of justice, or in civil offices —there is not a single private person, however humble, who has not to choose between serving God by obeying His command, or serving the 4 vain thing' — state institutions. My private life is interwoven with the general life of the state, which demands of me an unchristian activity directly contrary to the law of Christ. Nov/ with universal military service and the liability of all to serve on a jury, this dilemma is sharply presented to us all in a very striking manner. Every man must take the weapons I of murder — a sword and a bayonet, and must either kill, or at least load the rifle and sharpen the sword, that is prepare to kill. Every citizen must appear at the law-courts and par- ticipate in trial and punishment, that is to say must repudiate Christ's law about not resisting Ihim that is evil, and must do it not merely in words but in deeds.
The grenadier's question — The Gospel or the military code 1 The law of God or man's law % — now presents itself to humanity as it did in the days of Samuel. It presented itself to Christ himself, and to his disciples. It stands before those who now wish to be Christians in deed, and it stood before me.
The law of Christ, and his teachings of love, humility, and self-repudiation had previously always touched my heart and attracted me. But from all sides, both in history and around me at the present day and in my own life, I WHAT I BELIEVE saw a contrary law, repugnant to my heart and conscience and reason, but harmonizing with t my animal instincts. I felt if I accepted the law of Christ I should be isolated and it would go ill with me, I should be one of the perse- cuted and suffering, as Christ predicted. While if I accepted man's law, every one would approve; of it, and I should be at peace, secure, and have t at my service all manner of theological subtle- ties to set my conscience at rest. I should laugh and be merry as Christ said. I felt this, and therefore did not penetrate into the meaning of Christ's law, but tried to understand it so that it should not prevent my living my accus- tomed animal life. But to understand it so was impossible, and therefore I did not understand it at all.
In this non-comprehension I reached a state of perplexity which now astonishes me, and as an example of that perplexity I will give my former understanding of the words, 4 Judge not, that ye be not judged' (Matt. vii. 1), 1 c Judge not and ye shall not be judged: con- I demn not, and ye shall not be condemned ' (Luke vi. 37). The institution of law-courts in which I took part, and which defended the s safety of my property, appeared to me so $ indubitably sacred and accordant with the 1 law of God that it never occurred to me that i' these sayings could mean anything but that one must not speak ill of one's neighbour. It never entered my head that in those words Christ could have spoken of the law-courts, of the Zemstvo, of the Criminal Court, of the I LAW OF GOD AND LAW OF MAN 131 District Courts and magistrates, and of all the Senates and departments. Only when I under- stood the words about not resisting him that is evil in the direct sense, only then did the question occur to me of Christ’s attitude to all those courts and departments. And seeing that he must have disapproved of them, I asked myself: Does it not mean that one must not merely refrain from condemning one’s neigh- bour verbally, but must not judge him in the courts — must not condemn one’s neighbour by means of our law-courts?
In Luke vi. 37-49, these words are spoken immediately after the teaching of non-resistance to evil and of returning good for evil. Follow- ing the words, ‘ Be merciful as your Father in heaven is merciful,5 come the words, ‘ Judge i not, and ye shall not be judged: condemn not, and ye shall not be condemned.5 Does not this mean that besides not blaming one’s neighbour one must not set up law-courts, nor judge one’s neighbour in them? said I. And I only had to formulate that question, and my heart and my common sense at once replied affirmatively.
I know how this understanding of the words startles one at first. It startled me too. To show how far I was from such an understanding of the words I will confess to a shameful stupid* ity. When I had already become a believer, and read the Gospels as a divine book, I used, as a joke, to say to my friends, on meeting any of them who were public prosecutors or judges: ‘ And you go on judging, though it is written, “ Judge not that ye be not judged.55 5 WHAT I BELIEVE So sure was I that those words could mean nothing more than a prohibition of evil-speaking,, ( that I did not understand the terrible mockery of holy things my words contained. I had gone so far that, being convinced that these plain words did not mean what they do mean, I used them jokingly in their true sense.
I will recount in detail how all my doubts — j whether these words could be understood except ‘ as meaning that Christ totally forbids the human institution of any law-court, and that he could mean nothing else by those words — were de- stroyed.
The first thing that struck me, when I under- stood the law of non-resistance to the evil man in its direct meaning, was that man’s courts of law are not in accord with it, but are! directly opposed to it and to the meaning of ' the whole teaching, and that Christ therefore, s if he thought of the law-courts, must have ’ condemned them.
Christ says: 4 Resist not him that is evil.’ j: The purpose of the courts is to resist the evil j J man. Christ tells us to return good for evil, j ] The courts repay evil for evil.1 Christ tells j ( 1 Tolstoy here, and subsequently, begs the question j f whether it may not benefit a man to be forcibly restrained t * from pursuing an evil course. Confusion arises from j 1 the simultaneous discussion of the actual words attri- j t buted to Jesus and the general question of what j | really is true and sensible about man’s relation to his j fellow men. Tolstoy argued, in another place, that I. Christ’s word should only be accepted as authorita- 1 tive because they are true and reasonable. After that it is arguing in a circle to say that they are true and j reasonable because uttered by Christ.
LAW OF GOD AND LAW OF MAN 133 us not to distinguish good people from bad. The courts are entirely concerned in making the distinction. Christ says, forgive all men. Forgive not once, not seven times, but endlessly. Love your enemies and do good to them that hate you. The courts do not forgive, but punish. They deal out not good but evil to those they call the enemies of society. So it appeared evident that Christ must have con- demned the courts. But, thought I, perhaps Christ had nothing to do with the law-courts and was not thinking of them. But I saw that this could not be: from the day of his birth and until his death Christ came in conflict with the courts of Herod, of the Sanhedrin, and of the high priests. And I noticed that Christ often spoke directly of the courts as of an evil. He warned his disciples that they would be judged; and he told them how to bear themselves in the courts. Of himself he said that he would be condemned; and he himself set an example of how one should treat man’s courts of law. Therefore Christ thought of these human courts, which condemned him and his disciples and which have condemned and are condemning millions of people. Christ saw this evil and plainly indicated it. At the execu- tion of the sentence of the court on the woman taken in adultery he plainly repudiated the court and showed that man must not judge, because he is himself guilty. And he expressed that iame thought several times, saying that with iirt in one’s own eye one cannot see the dirt a another’s eye and that the blind must not WHAT I BELIEVE lead the blind. He even explains what results ( from such a blunder. The pupil becomes like i his master.
But perhaps having said this about the judge- j ment on the woman taken in adultery and having put forth parables about the founda- tions of the house, referring to the general weakness of mankind, he nevertheless does 1 not forbid appeals to human courts of law for the purpose of obtaining protection from evil men. But I saw that this is quite inadmissible.
In the Sermon on the Mount, addressing everybody, he says: ‘ And if any man will sue ‘ thee at law and take away thy coat, let him have thy cloak also.’ Therefore he forbids any one to go to law. But perhaps Christ speaks only of each man’s personal relation to the courts, and does not condemn the process of law itself, but allows in Christian society oh* people who judge others in institutions estab- lished for that purpose? But neither can this be supposed. Christ, in the prayer he gave, bids all men without exception to forgive others that they may be forgiven their own sins. And he repeats the thought often. Therefore, every man when he prays and before bringing his gift to the altar should forgive every one. How can a man, who by the faith he professes must always forgive all men, judge and con- demn any one in the law-courts? It follows that, according to Christ’s teaching, there can be no such things as Christian courts which i inflict punishment. a LAW OF GOD AND LAW OF MAN 135 But perhaps the context shows that in this passage Christ, ’when he says, 4 Judge not, that ye be not judged/ was not thinking of human courts of justice? But this again is not so; on the contrary, it is clear from the context that when he said, 4 Judge not/ Christ was speaking precisely of the institution of law- courts. In Matthew and Luke, before saying, 4 Judge not/ he says: Resist not him that is evil, endure evil, do good to all men. And before that, in Matthew, he repeats the words of the Hebrew criminal code, 4 An eye for an eye, and a tooth for a tooth.’ And after this refer- ence to the criminal law, he says: But ye shall not do so; resist not him that is evil; and then i he adds, 4 Judge not.’ Therefore Christ speaks precisely of human criminal law, and repudiates it by the words, 4 Judge not.’
Moreover, in Luke, he not only says, 4 Judge not,’ but 4 Judge not...and condemn not.’ That word 4 condemn,’ wdiich has so similar a meaning, was not added for nothing. The addition can have had only one aim — to eluci- date the sense in which the word 4 judge ’ is used.
If he had meant to say, do not judge your neigJibour, he would have added that word 4 neighbour,’ but he adds the word which is translated 4 do not condemn,’ and then adds, 4 that ye be not condemned; forgive all men and you will be forgiven.’
But perhaps, all the same, Christ was not thinking of the law-courts when he said this, and I may be attributing my own thought 136 WHAT I BELIEVE to liis words which had a different mean- ing.
So I asked myself how Christ’s first disciples, the Apostles, regarded man’s law-courts. Did they acknowledge them, or approve of them?
In chap. iv. 11, the Apostle James says: £ Speak not evil one of another, brethren, for he that speaketh evil of his brother, and judgeth his brother, speaketh evil of the law, and judgeth the law: but if thou judge the law, thou art not a doer of the law, but a judge. One only is the law-giver, and judge, even he who is able to save or to destroy: Who art thou that judgeth another? ’ The word translated ‘ speak evil of ’ is KaraXaXeo). Without referring to the dic- tionary one can see that this word must mean indict. And so it does, as any one may convince himself by a reference to the dictionary. It is translated, “ Who speaks evil of his brother, speaks evil of the law.’ One involuntarily asks, Why? However much I may speak evil of my brother, I do not speak evil of the law; but if I indict and bring my brother before the court of law, I evidently thereby condemn the law of Christ: that is to say, I consider the law of Christ insufficient and indict and condemn his law. Then it is clear that I do not fulfil his law, but constitute myself its judge. The judge, says Christ, is he who can save. But how shall I, who am not able to save, be a judge, and inflict punishments?
The whole passage speaks of human law- LAW OP GOD AND LAW OP MAN 13?
courts and repudiates them. The whole of the Epistle is full of that thought. In the Epistle of James (ii. 1-13) it is said: (1) [‘ My brethren, let the faith of our Lord Jesus Christ be held without respect of persons.] (2) Por if there come unto your assembly a man with a gold ring, in fine clothing, and there come in also a poor man in vile clothing; (3) And ye have regard to him that weareth the fine clothing, and say unto him, Sit thou here in a good place; and say to the poor, Stand thou there, or sit here under my footstool: (4) Are ye not then partial in yourselves, and are become judges of evil thoughts? (5) Hearken, my beloved brethren, Hath not God chosen the poor of this world, rich in faith and heirs of the kingdom which he hath promised to them that love him? (6) But ye have despised the poor. Do not rich men oppress you and themselves drag you before the judgement seats? Do not they « blaspheme that worthy name by the which ye are called? (8) If ye fulfil the royal law according to the scripture, Thou shalt love i thy neighbour as thyself (Lev. xix. 18), ye do well. (9) But if ye have respect to persons, ye commit sin, and are convicted of the law as transgressors. (10) Por whosoever shall keep the whole law, and yet offend in one point, he is guilty of all. (11) Por he who said, Do not commit adultery, said also, Do not kill. Now if thou commit no adultery, yet if thou kill, thou art become a transgressor of the law (Deut.
Jxxii. 22; Lev. xviii. 17-25). (12) So speak ye, and so do, as they that shall be judged by the f* 1 WHAT I BELIEVE law of liberty. (13) For he shall have judge- ment without mercy that hath showed no mercy; < and mercy rejoiceth against judgement.’ The last words have often been translated: 4 Mercy is proclaimed in the courts/ and were so translated to imply that there may be Chris- tian courts of law, but that they must be merciful.
James exhorts the brethren not to make dis- tinctions between people. If you make distinc- tions, you oL€KpiOr]T€, are divided in your minds, like the judges with evil intentions in the courts. You have judged the poor to be worse. But on the contrary it is the rich man who is worse. He both oppresses you and drags you before the courts. If you live according to the law of love of your neighbour, according to the law of charity (which, in distinction from the other law^, James calls the c law of the Lord ’), you do well. But if you regard persons, and make distinctions between man and man, you are offenders against the law of mercy. And, having probably in mind the example of the woman taken in adultery whom they brought before Christ that she might be stoned, or the sin of adultery in general, James says that he who exe- j cutes the adulterers will be guilty of murder and | will infringe the external law. For the same, external law forbids both adultery and murder.; He says: 4 Behave like men who are judged by the r law of liberty. For there is no mercy for him who has no mercy, and therefore mercy destroys j the courts' a.
How could that be said more clearly and ^ LAW OF GOD AND LAW OF MAN 139 definitely? All discrimination between people t is forbidden, every judgement that this man is good and that man evil, directly indicates that the human courts are undoubtedly bad, and proves that the court itself is criminal, as it executes people for offences, and therefore itself infringes God’s law of charity.
I read the Epistles of St. Paul, who himself suffered from the courts, and in the very first chapter of the Epistle to the Romans I found a reprimand which he addresses to the Romans for their various sins and errors, and among the rest for their courts (v. 32): 4 Who knowing j the judgement of God, that they which commit such things are worthy of death, not only do the same, but have pleasure in them that do them.’ Chap. ii. 1: 4 Therefore thou art without excuse, 0 man, whosoever thou art, who judgest; for wherein thou judgest another, thou condemnest thyself; for thou that judgest dost 1 practise the same things. (2) And we are sure that the judgement of God is according to truth against them which commit such things. (3) And thinkest thou this, 0 man, that judgest them which do such things, and doest the same, that thou shalt escape the judgement of God? : (4) Or despisest thou the riches of his goodness and forbearance and longsuffering; not know- ing that the goodness of God leadeth thee to repentance? ’ The Apostle Paul says that they, knowing (the righteous law of God, themselves do wrong and teach others to do the same, and therefore the man who judges cannot be justified.
WHAT I BELIEVE Such is the attitude to the law-courts^which I found in the Epistles of the Apostles; and in c their lives as we all know man’s courts appeared an evil and a temptation which had to be endured with firmness and with submission to the will of God.
By reconstructing in one’s imagination the position of the first Christians among the J heathen, one can easily understand tha,t the Christians, who were persecuted in man’s law- courts, could not prohibit law-courts. Only incidentally could they allude to that evil, con- demning its foundations, as they did.
I consulted the Fathers of the Church of the? first centuries, and saw that they always define the difference between their teaching and that of all others by the fact that they never put compulsion on any one in any way and never went to law with any one (see Athenagoras and Origen), did not execute, but only endured, the j torments to which they were condemned by man’s courts. All the martyrs, by their deeds, made the same profession. I saw that all the i Christians, till the time of Constantine, re- ( garded the law-courts not otherwise than as an, ( evil which had to be patiently endured, and j that the thought could never enter the head of any Christian of those days that Christians ( could take part in prosecutions. I saw that j the words of Christ, e Judge not that ye be not j • judged,’ were understood by his first disciples | • as I now understand them in their direct mean- j j ing: ‘ Do not prosecute in the courts, and do not participate in them.’ i LAW OF GOD AND LAW OF MAN 141 Everything indubitably confirmed my con- viction that the words 4 Judge not and condemn not 5 mean, do not judge in the courts; yet the explanation that it means, do not malign your neighbour, is so generally accepted, and so boldly and confidently do the courts flourish in all Christian countries, supported even by the Church, that I long doubted the correctness of my interpretation. If everybody could explain the matter in this way and organize Christian courts, then probably they had some ground for so doing, and there is something I do not under- stand, said I to myself. There must be grounds on which the words are understood to mean 4 to malign,5 and there must be grounds for insti- ll tuting Christian courts.
And 1 1 examined the explanations of the ecclesiastical theologians. In all these inter- pretations, from the fifth century onward, I i found that the words were taken in the sense of condemnation of one’s neighbour, that is, maligning. And as the words are taken only to mean condemning one’s neighbour in words, the question arises — how can one refrain from con- demning? Evil must be condemned! There- fore all the interpretations revolve round the 4 question, what one may and what one may not condemn. It is said (St. Chrysostom and Theophilus) that for the servants of the Church it must not be understood as a prohibition to judge, for the Apostles themselves judged. It is said that probably Christ referred to the Jews 1 who condemned their neighbours for small sins and themselves committed great ones.
I WHAT I BELIEVE But nowhere is a word said of the insti- tution of courts of law and of the relation in which the courts stand to this condemnation of judging. Does Christ forbid them, or allow them?
To that particular question no reply is given, as though it were quite obvious that as soon as a Christian occupied a judge’s seat, he might not merely condemn his neighbour, but have him executed.
I consulted the Greek, the Catholic, and the Protestant writers, and the writers of the Tubingen school and of the historical school. All of them, even the most free -thinking, understood those words as a condemnation of evil-speaking. But why the words, contrary to the whole teaching of Christ, are understood so narrowly that the courts are not included in the prohibition of judging; why it is supposed that Christ, forbidding as an evil deed a condemna- tion of one’s neighbour that involuntarily slips from one’s tongue, does not consider as evil and does not forbid a similar condemnation uttered deliberately and associated with the infliction of violence on the person condemned is not explained, nor is there the slightest hint that it is possible for £ condemnation ’ to mean the judging which takes place in the law-court and from which millions of people suffer. More than that, in dealing with these words, £ Judge not and condemn not,’ reference to that most cruel habit of legal condemnation is carefully avoided, and even fenced off. The theologian-inter- preters remark that Christian law-courts must LAW OF GOD AND LAW OF MAN 143 exist and do not conflict with the law of Christ.
Noticing this, I began to doubt the good faith of these interpretations, and referred to the translation of the words 4 judge 5 and 4 con- demn ’ — the very matter with which I ought to have begun.
In the original these words are Kplvu and KaraStKa The incorrect translation of the word KOTaStKa^o) in the Epistle of James, where it is translated by the words 4 speak evil of/ confirmed my suspicion of the in- correctness of the translations.
I looked how the words Kpivw and KaraSiKa fco are translated in the Gospels in different languages, and I saw that the word which in the Vulgate is translated condemnare, is translated in a similar way in French, while in Slavonic it is 4 condemn/ and Luther translates it Verdammen, to curse.
The contrast of these translations strengthemployed in both the Gospels, mean, and also the word KarahiKa^, used by Luke the Evan- gelist, who, in the opinion of the experts, wrote rather good Greek? How would a man trans- late those words who knew nothing of the Gospel teaching and the existing interpreta- tions of it, but had before him merely that- saying?
I consulted the general dictionary and found that the word /cpiVw has many different meanings, and among them very commonly WHAT I BELIEVE the meaning of sentencing in the law-court, | even executing, but that it never has the < ‘ meaning of evil-speaking. I consulted the New Testament dictionary and found that the word is often used in the New Testament in the sense of to sentence in court. It is sometimes used in the sense of differentiation, but never in the sense of evil-speaking. And 4 so I see that the word Kpcv w may be translated variously, but that a translation which makes it mean 6 speak evil 5 is the most far-fetched and unexpected of all.