What Is Persecution?
defining and discerning the character of Covid restrictions
Concluding our last chapter, I asked these questions:
Well, then, what about persecution? If the government is persecuting believers, what should believers do?
Before we can really ask these questions, we must define the term, “persecution.” When the state establishes “approved” churches, with heavy regulation, and refuses to allow any other Christian assemblies to meet (under the pains of arrest, fines, and imprisonment), is that persecution? When the state issues public health orders and, after repeated warnings, shuts down meetings where the participants refuse to comply, even going to the extent of arresting offending pastors, is that persecution?
Some would answer, “Yes,” to both scenarios. Others will say, “Yes,” to the first and “No,” to the second.1 Who is right? How would we know? Is it just a matter of opinion?
Definitions:
The Lexham Bible Dictionary gives this definition of persecution: “Mistreatment of a person or group on the basis of ethnicity, nationality, race, religion, or beliefs.”2 A competing definition from the Harper’s Bible Dictionary imposes a limitation that persecution is something done only to groups, not to individuals.3 This would make Daniel’s experience in the lion’s den “not persecution” and the fiery furnace experience of the “three Hebrew children” also “not persecution.” Persecution can be hostility or mistreatment directed to a person or a group (or class of persons), it seems strange to limit the expression in this way.
Another article in LBD gives this more specific definition to “Persecution of the Early Church,” “The physical, psychological, economic, or social pain, distress, or loss that was inflicted on Christians because of their beliefs and practices.”4
The key part of the Lexham definitions is the basis of the mistreatment. When someone mistreats an individual or a class of individuals because of characteristics like ethnicity, nationality, race, religion, or beliefs, that is persecution. Racism, therefore, results in persecution. When the resentment motivating the hostility is ethnically or racially based, that is the spirit of persecution. In a sense, persecution based on religion or belief is a kind of “spiritual racism.”
The definition given above is a start to our understanding, but there is more to it than this. The words translated “persecute” or “persecution” in both the Old and New Testaments have the root idea of “to pursue, run after.”5 Sometimes, the correct translation is simply “pursuit,” while other contexts demand “persecute” or “persecution.” That idea of pursuit underlies the idea of persecution. The individual or group becomes the focus of the pursuer for some reason (ethnicity, nationality, race, religion, or beliefs) and the activity of the pursuer is pursuit, or persecution. Pursuit because you are the wrong ethnicity. Pursuit because you are the wrong nationality. Pursuit because you are the wrong race. Pursuit because you are the wrong religion. Pursuit because you have the wrong beliefs.
In various Bible dictionary articles on persecution, the history of persecution for religion especially is the focus. Some articles are more comprehensive than others. The International Standard Bible Encyclopedia gives the most thorough survey of persecution of the articles I found. These surveys show how individuals especially suffered for their faith at various times in Biblical history. Parallels continue in post-Biblical history as various governments, from imperial Rome to the Muslim hordes attacked believers for what they believed, and for no other cause.6
In Matthew 23, as Jesus condemns the Pharisees for their much hypocrisy, he links them to the Old Testament persecution of the prophets, which they will imitate against the New Testament prophets Jesus will send to them. (Mt 23.34-35). The Intertestamental Period likewise saw frequent mistreatment of God’s people “because of their refusal to embrace idolatry, and of their fidelity to the Mosaic Law and the worship of God.”7 The Epistle to the Hebrews sums up Old Testament and Intertestamental persecution thus:
Heb 11.36 and others experienced mockings and scourgings, yes, also chains and imprisonment. 37 They were stoned, they were sawn in two, they were tempted, they were put to death with the sword; they went about in sheepskins, in goatskins, being destitute, afflicted, ill-treated 38 (men of whom the world was not worthy), wandering in deserts and mountains and caves and holes in the ground.
In the New Testament, Jesus predicted persecution to come for himself and for his followers. Despite this, he also taught that persecution was a blessing, saying in the Beatitudes:
Mt 5.10-11 “Blessed are those who have been persecuted for the sake of righteousness, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. 11 ¶ “Blessed are you when people insult you and persecute you, and falsely say all kinds of evil against you because of Me.
Again, it is important to keep in mind the basis of persecution. Matthew 5.10: “for the sake of righteousness” (i.e. gospel righteousness) and Matthew 5.11: “because of Me.” Peter warns in his epistle that Christians must distinguish between suffering for cause and suffering for faith.
1 Pt 2.20 For what credit is there if, when you sin and are harshly treated, you endure it with patience? But if when you do what is right and suffer for it you patiently endure it, this finds favor with God.
1 Pt 3.14 But even if you should suffer for the sake of righteousness, you are blessed. AND DO NOT FEAR THEIR INTIMIDATION, AND DO NOT BE TROUBLED,
1 Pt 3.17 For it is better, if God should will it so, that you suffer for doing what is right rather than for doing what is wrong.
1 Pt 4.14-17 If you are reviled for the name of Christ, you are blessed, because the Spirit of glory and of God rests on you. 15 Make sure that none of you suffers as a murderer, or thief, or evildoer, or a troublesome meddler; 16 but if anyone suffers as a Christian, he is not to be ashamed, but is to glorify God in this name. 17 For it is time for judgment to begin with the household of God; and if it begins with us first, what will be the outcome for those who do not obey the gospel of God?
Quite clearly, there is a difference between suffering for violating laws, or even being “a troublesome meddler” (1 Pt 4.14) and suffering as a Christian, for the Lord’s sake.
John Rutherford, in the previously mentioned ISBE article, outlines the forms persecution can take this way:
The methods of persecution which were employed by the Jews, and also by the heathen against the followers of Christ, were such as these: (1) Men would revile them and would say all manner of evil against them falsely, for Christ’s sake (Mt 5:11). (2) Contempt and disparagement: “Say we not well that thou art a Samaritan, and hast a demon?” (Jn 8:48); “If they have called the master of the house Beelzebub, how much more them of his household!” (Mt 10:25). (3) Being, solely on account of their loyalty to Christ, forcibly separated from the company and the society of others, and expelled from the synagogues or other assemblies for the worship of God: “Blessed are ye, when men shall hate you, and when they shall separate you from their company, and reproach you, and cast out your name as evil, for the Son of man’s sake” (Lk 6:22); “They shall put you out of the synagogues” (Jn 16:2). (4) Illegal arrest and spoliation of goods, and death itself.8
More briefly:
False witness
Holding up to public ridicule and contempt
Expulsion from society
Illegal arrest, fines, and even death
Space prohibits any survey of post-NT persecution in the Roman Empire. The persecution began in earnest with Nero’s offering up Christians as scapegoats for the fire of Rome, but continued through the centuries until Constantine and the Edict of Milan. Rutherford remarks at the central motive for the ongoing persecution:
But one of the most powerful causes of the hatred entertained by the heathen against the Christians was, that though there were no citizens so loyal as they, yet in every case in which the laws and customs of the empire came into conflict with the will of God, their supreme rule was loyalty to Christ, they must obey God rather than man. To worship Caesar, to offer even one grain of incense on the shrine of Diana, no Christian would ever consent, not even when this minimum of compliance would save life itself.9
Notice the issue: worship. Not the fact that the Christians worshiped their own God, but that they refused to worship the gods of the Romans. The issue is always worship, “Who do you serve?” It is interesting to note that some countries give freedom of worship, but not freedom of proselytization. In modern Israel, for example, Christians are free to worship, but not to witness. Is this persecution? Well, the Christians of Israel may wish for more freedom, but they resort to indirect methods of witness to avoid running foul of these laws. Evangelism in Israel is creative by necessity.
Biblical Case Studies: Daniel and friends
The book of Daniel gives us three separate occasions where Daniel and his friends came into conflict with government edicts. These cases bring some clarity, and we find the apostolic declaration, “We must obey God rather than man,” clearly illustrated by these events. The three occasions are:
Daniel 1, the issue of eating the king’s meat
Daniel 3, the issue of worshiping the king’s image
Daniel 6, the issue of offering prayer to God
In each instance, religious beliefs were at stake.
· Daniel 1, the laws of cleanness and uncleanness “Daniel made up his mind that he would not defile himself with the king's choice food or with the wine which he drank” (Dan 1.8)
· Daniel 3, the first and second commandments – Nebuchadnezzar commanded worship of an image, God commanded exclusive worship for himself alone and forbad the use of images.
· Daniel 6, the law of worship – the prayers of the faithful are reserved to God alone, “for you shall not worship any other god, for the LORD, whose name is Jealous, is a jealous God” (Ex 34.14)
Notice, however, the difference in responses.
· When the issue was worship, there were no legitimate alternatives for the believers.
The “Hebrew children,” Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, had no options when they received the command to worship the image. There was no “half-way house” to run to. They couldn’t suggest an alternative that could satisfy the command and keep their conscience clear. Thus, they stood in defiance of the law.
Likewise, Daniel, when confronted with the new law requiring all to direct their petitions to the king alone, found himself with no middle ground. There was no alternative, you either obeyed the command or refused to obey. As we know, Daniel continued to offer his prayers to the God of Israel alone.
· When the issue was human welfare, Daniel and his friends could satisfy the goals of the king without compromising their dietary codes.
In this case, the command of the king didn’t attack the Israelite religion as such, rather the king gave his order to provide himself with a cadre of healthy young civil servants. In his mind, the best way to ensure that was to provide the best of everything, including the same diet he ate. While his command conflicted with Hebrew religion, it wasn’t targeted at Hebrew religion. As we know, Daniel found an acceptable alternative.
Applications
Having taken the time to define persecution and its basis, to distinguish between suffering as a wrong-doer and suffering as a servant of Christ, and to consider some Biblical case studies, let’s look again at the “Covid rebels,” the pastors who are defying government health orders and claiming they are suffering for their beliefs.
What are the various provincial governments attempting to secure by their orders? Are they trying to suppress Christianity as a part of our society?
Is Christianity prohibited? No.
Is Christian worship forbidden? No.10
Is Christian preaching subject to government restriction or dictate? No, pastors are free to preach the gospel and free to preach against the government if they choose.
Are there viable alternatives such that churches can continue worship services to some degree? Thankfully, yes. Online services, while inadequate, provide an alternative that preserved the gathering of churches through the ordeal. (To my mind, Zoom and YouTube are like Daniel’s vegetables and water – Dan 1.13.)
What is the issue? The government limited public assembly for all groups to prevent or slow down the spread of the Covid virus. While it is true that there are some inconsistencies — some groups more restricted than others — in general, the restrictions applied to all for a medical, not a religious reason.
Moreover, these measures are temporary, not permanent. Admittedly, they made things miserable for Christians and churches (and many other people). Nevertheless, the governments enacted no permanent changes to society with their public health orders.
The government is liable to criticism about their orders, on a scientific or medical basis. Yet the government has the authority to issue such orders and Christians have no ground to resist the orders as anti-Christian, or on the basis that God’s laws trump health orders.
In short, there is no basis to claim persecution in this matter. The government isn’t targeting religion. It is targeting (perhaps clumsily) a virus. There is a big difference!
Other possible answers exist, to be sure, but these two answers are the most likely.
Ronald D. Roberts, “Persecution,” in John D. Barry et al., eds., Lexham Bible Dictionary (Bellingham, WA: Lexham Press, 2016).
“Persecution” in Paul J. Achtemeier, ed., Harper’s Bible Dictionary, 1st ed. (San Francisco: Harper & Row, 1985).
Brian J. Tabb, “Persecution of the Early Church,” Barry et al., Lexham Bible Dictionary.
OT: “persecute” (רדף, rdp) and “persecution” (מרדף, mrdp); NT: “persecution” (διωγμός, diōgmos) and “persecute” (διώκω, diōkō)
We should note that the religious wars between Islam and so-called “Christendom” don’t really fall in this category. Whatever they were, they were not merely “mistreatment” because of religion, they were political strivings using the cloak of religion to achieve their ends.
John Rutherfurd, “Persecution,” James Orr et al., eds., The International Standard Bible Encyclopedia (Chicago: The Howard-Severance Company, 1915), 2323.
Rutherford, “Persecution” Orr et al., 2324.
Rutherfurd, “Persecution,” Orr et al., 2327.
Expressions of worship were restricted, and on occasion some expressions were prohibited for a time. Though this is unhappy, frustrating, challenging, and perhaps more restrictive than necessary, are we truly going to argue that we cannot worship in a Zoom gathering? Are we only able to worship within the sacred walls of our buildings and nowhere else? And are we going to argue that the government's actions intentionally targeted Christian worship assemblies as such, rather than targeting the virus and attempting to slow its spread?