Citizenship, Oaths, and Shalom

by Adam Dickson

Much lively debate has been sparked recently within Britain by Lord Peter Goldsmith, who has proposed that school-leavers be obligated to swear an oath of allegiance to Queen and Country. This suggestion, which has met mixed reception from the general public, was written with the intention of improving the sense of what it means to be a British citizen within the minds of teenagers. Among the most interesting debates this has provoked thus far involves the meaning of citizenship for those of us who consider ourselves Christian.

Oaths are thought to be very powerful. For example, one might employ them to stress truthfulness, i.e., “I swear that this is the truth,” and so on. Elsewhere, an oath would be taken as an affirmation of a person’s loyalty before the State and its decrees. An important question is, could this be the way that God intended things to be? For many of us in the church, it might seem like a foregone conclusion. After all, we are naturally citizens of the country we inhabit. What, we ask, is the spiritual problem with an oath of allegiance or affirmation? On the subject of oaths in general, we find that Jesus has this to say:

Matthew 5:33-37
"Again, you have heard that it was said to the people long ago, 'Do not break your oath, but keep the oaths you have made to the Lord.' But I tell you, Do not swear at all: either by heaven, for it is God's throne; or by the earth, for it is his footstool; or by Jerusalem, for it is the city of the Great King. And do not swear by your head, for you cannot make even one hair white or black. Simply let your 'Yes' be 'Yes,' and your 'No,' 'No'; anything beyond this comes from the evil one.”

It is somewhat intriguing that we should find a teaching about oaths smack bang in the middle of a chapter devoted to the exhortation of Kingdom values. The Gospel of Matthew places Jesus’ epic Sermon on the Mount at the very pinnacle of His ministry. Having freshly emerged from His fast and temptation within the desert regions, we find Jesus firstly declaring “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand.” (Matthew 4:17) This declaration is the absolute forerunner of Jesus’ entire ministry of preaching and healing, for it is with urgency that Matthew has Him stating it, and then going further on to demonstrate just what it is He means by this, whether by words or works of the miraculous. That the “Kingdom of Heaven is at hand” would have special significance for an oppressed nation under Roman imperial occupation. Anticipation for the long-awaited Messiah of Hebrew Scriptures, perceived to be a “warrior-king,” would have been quite high. To declare that the Kingdom of Heaven is at hand is going to shake the Jewish people of this time to their very core. For them, it means that a new political order is coming into the land, and salvation from oppression is finally happening for those who were faithful to God.

So what does Jesus open with, after making this declaration, after calling His very first disciples, after performing several miraculous healings, and finally galvanising a multitude to listen to His words?

“Blessed are the poor in spirit,” He says, “for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.”

He continues, “Blessed are those who mourn… those who are meek… those who hunger and thirst for righteousness… those who are merciful… those who are pure in heart… those who are peacemakers… and those who are persecuted, reviled, and have evil performed against them for the sake of righteousness.”

It appears that this sermon, within which Jesus gives us His teaching of oaths, establishes how this kingdom will operate through the relationships its members hold with one another, and the heart with which these relationships are approached. It is especially significant that a stern admonishment against the taking of oaths should be given in a narrative which exalts those who, by worldly standards, would be considered to be quite weak, powerless, and unworthy. The centrality of these kingdom values is also emphasised in the teachings immediately following those about oaths, where Jesus commands us to not retaliate against evil by doing evil in turn, but by turning the other cheek. Likewise, we are commanded to love not only those who reciprocate our love, but also our worst enemies, this teaching being characterised by an instruction to “be perfect, as your heavenly Father is perfect.” The Greek term employed to describe such love in this narrative is agape, the self-sacrificing, indiscriminating, and redemptive goodwill shown toward a person completely irrespective of reciprocation. It was with this love that Jesus would eventually sacrifice Himself for the sake of the world, giving the ultimate example of compassion to all who would follow Him.

How does all of this tie in to the problem of citizenship? The thematic emphasis of Jesus’ sermon lies in the relationships we all hold toward one another, and, in overcoming our sins, surrendering power from ourselves and giving it into the hands of the One who created us. That we “cannot even make one hair white or black” is very significant here, because Jesus is saying that we actually try to exert our own power in an oath, as well as invoke that by which we swear. Bound up in the concept of allegiance is simultaneous acknowledgement of a particular thing having power over us, and us in turn having power over it also. Jesus strikes to the heart of this thinking by giving us an understanding of where true power lies, not in ourselves, but ultimately in God.

This is reflected in scripture quite prominently when Paul says:

“But our citizenship is in heaven, and from it we await a Saviour, the Lord Jesus Christ, who will transform our lowly body to be like his glorious body, by the power that enables him even to subject all things to himself.” – Philippians 3:20-21

This verse underpins three important points: That our true citizenship belongs in Heaven alone, that our way of life is one of transformation, and that this transformation comes by the power of the one true Lord, Jesus Christ, who brings “all things” together and unifies them. One of the consistent themes within the New Testament literature is that this power comes into the world and undermines the self-exalted worldly powers. To enact sole allegiance to one of these, rather than embodying the citizenship of Heaven, is to stifle our prophetic calling for the power of God to act within us and through us towards all people.

This highlights the problematic nature of national citizenship for we who are Christians, for we are called to citizenship of one Kingdom alone, whose members potentially encompass the whole world, not just the place of our social identity. As co-director of Ekklesia Simon Barrow recently put it, we Christians must focus on “practical ways of organising our public lives which enable people to belong to one another across boundaries like those created by nation states, not in subjection to them.”

One of the ways in which this national citizenship is most tragically visible is within the armed forces, where young men and women are called to a concept of citizenship and given the idea that protecting national security at all costs is something good and honourable. This illusion arguably carries little if not none of the self-sacrificing, merciful, and redemptive agape love of which Jesus speaks. The sad yet logical conclusion of an oath of allegiance is the willingness of the oath-bearer to bind their own life to it in service, when Jesus says “whoever would be great among you must be the slave of all.” (Mark 10:44)

It is within this servitude that we find our Biblical sense of peace, or shalom, at work, as we seek to frame our relationships within the context of global citizenship. This understanding of peace, while perhaps not directly referenced within the texts of oaths and citizenship, nonetheless underpins our fundamental interactions with others as well as the way in which we view ourselves within the interconnected and holistic framework of God’s story, as told within the scriptures and through the experiences of the Church. This is a thoroughly different and more radical form of citizenship than is conventionally understood, in which we approach all peoples and nations with fresh creativity and peacemaking. Being able to let our “yes be yes, and our no be no,” may not simply be about being prepared to tell the truth when prompted, but also to live out the radical truth of God’s Kingdom as its humble citizens.