Rigby5 wrote:
I believe that Christianity calls for an impractical passivity, such as "turn the other cheek".
The scripture you are speaking of has been taken out of its historical and cultural context by most christians. When Christ said to "turn the other cheek" he was not preaching passivity. Instead he was exhorting his followers, who were all jews at that point in time, to not allow those of the ruling faction to cause them to react to a slight and be dragged before a roman court.
During that period of time, a higher caste jew might strike one perceived as a lower caste with the back of their hand. This was not a full blown punch, but was akin to the modern islamic insult of hitting someone with the sole of your shoe. It was meant to show superiority over that person, higher rank, and to denigrate them in the eyes of those who witnessed this event.
Christ was telling his followers (who were most assuredly being persecuted at this point by both the romans and the ranking jews who saw this new movement as a threat to their secular power) to not react when struck in this condescending and degrading manner. He was exhorting them to turn the other cheek to, in essence, tell the one who gave the insult that their insult meant so little that they could do it again if they wished. Think of it as a "sticks and stones" type of gesture.
Christ was exhorting them to do this because if one of his followers actually retaliated, then the matter would most likely end up in a roman court. Romans were concerned about two things, power and money, and if the matter ended up in a roman court then Christ's follower would almost certainly be heavily fined and jailed until that fine was paid.
This is the reason for the "turn the other cheek" message. But christians like to take it out of its historical and cultural context and give it a completely different meaning than what was meant during that timeframe.
Christians generally do that quite often. That is why you find most christians find it difficult to explain "turn the other cheek" and Christ's exhortation to his followers for "he who is without a sword, let him go and buy one". The two are incompatible unless you look at them in their context.
While Christ was most assuredly one who wanted peace, as the nature of God is described as love and love is hard to maintain if you are killing the other person, he also was very blunt in stating that he came not to bring peace but to bring a sword to the world. He knew his message would generate conflict, and that those opposed to it would fight back with violence. That is why he told his followers to go and buy a sword. If guns were available, he would have probably told them to go get a gun. There is nothing unchristianlike in defending yourself from evil, or in thwarting evil men and women bent on violence ... even if you have to use violence as your vehicle to stop them.
So passivity is not correct, but many people who call themselves christian believe that is the message.
