Some Americans took to the streets to celebrate when Osama bin Laden was dead. When I saw this party I was initially troubled. We should celebrate the death of someone? The Bible does not say to love your enemies? It is not good to celebrate the death of someone who lived to kill as many innocent Americans as possible? These issues have been discussed in university classrooms, Sunday school classes and sports bars across the Columbus Community.
It is a fallacy to compare the commemoration of Americans with the conclusion of the Middle East, when they were destroyed the twin towers in New York. The special operations team that claimed bin Laden was to destroy a terrorist, a man fanatically evil that not blinking an eye or even feel a twinge of guilt when he destroyed 3,000 innocent men, women and children. The Muslim fanatics and disillusioned celebrated the killing of innocent children. The Americans were celebrating the assassination of an evil terrorist.
Emerging church leader Brian McLaren expressed concern that our celebrations proved that were "simply turning more difficult in cycle of violence." He is hinting that we are no better than the terrorists and that the taking of life is weighed by the same laws of morality? This is not the case. We do not have stooped to the level of Islamic terrorists until we drop a bomb on the mosque of Mecca. Can he not be compared to a man who breaks into his house and kills his mother? This is pure evil. If you pick up a gun and defend his mother, killing the attacker are you and the murderer also guilty of breaking the moral code that protects the sanctity of life? It is not acceptable to take a lifetime to protect many innocent lives? Isn't that really what a just war is over?
St. Augustine of Hippo was the echoing Cicero of ancient Rome, when he taught the four elements of a just war (1):
The damage caused by the aggressor must be lasting, grave, and certain.
All possibilities should be explored of known to end the conflict before taking up arms.
The prospect of success should be a clear possibility and likely
The use of weapons should be limited to remove the wrong main target.
Taking out Osama bin Laden was an act of war fair. He was identified as the perpetrator and the master mind behind the fall of the twin towers. The damage caused by him were serious and lasting. He had almost a decade to turn himself in and face justice, thus saving the lives of hundreds who have died as a result of the 911. The mission had been planned well and, obviously, the prospect of success was promising and the assault was limited to composed of bin Laden.
Dennis Prager (2) deals with what appears to be a contradiction of Judeo-Christian teaching on our satisfaction over the death. There is a Talmudic teaching that reveals a God whose love for his creatures from rejoice when they are destroyed, "when the Egyptians were drowning in the sea of Reeds, the angels wanted to sing. But God said to them: ' the work of my hands are drowning in the sea and you want to sing? ' "Prager points out that God was reprimanding angels, not humans.
But the book of proverbs says, "when the wicked perish, there is joyful song." (Proverbs 11:10). Elsewhere we read in proverbs, "when your enemy falls, do not rejoice, and when he stumbles, let your heart not exult, for which the Lord sees and be unhappy ..." (Proverbs 35) It may sound like a contradiction, but Prager points out that "most truly evil is not our personal enemies." When Americans celebrate the death of an enemy really bad as Osama bin Laden are it doesn't actually revels in victory of good over evil. How can it be wrong?
There may be confusion on this issue because the majority of Americans have never experienced real bad. Corrie ten Boom survived Hitler's death camps. Many years later she was faced with one of the men who perpetrated by the death of millions, including some of her family and friends. Corrie described his struggle: "even when angry vengeful thoughts boiled through me, I saw the sin of them. Jesus Christ died for this man; I was going to ask for more? Lord Jesus, I prayed, forgive me and help me to forgive him. " Who knows if this man had repented of his evil? What is known is that he had stopped participating in these evil deeds. Corrie ten Boom took the high road, seeking forgiveness that originates just in the heart of Christ.
In contrast, Holocaust historian Saul Friedlander says a Jewish prisoner in Auschwitz called Arie Hassenberg. Arie saw after the Allied bombing in Monowitz and said, "to see a German killed; that is why we appreciate the bombing. " Ten Boom and Hassenberg experienced terrible evil in the hands of evil men. Corrie ten Boom pardoned a man who had stopped their bad practices. Hassenburg rejoiced at seeing a German killed because he embodies evil in mind that he was experiencing.
Osama bin Laden had not stopped his evil ways, or he had expressed any remorse. In fact, evidence gathered since the Wolfsschanze suggest that he was more active than ever in planning future attacks on American women and innocent children. To see a dead terrorist is why Americans enjoyed seeing the killing.
The theory of just war Catholic Church by Scott p. Richert
http://www.jewishjournal.com/dennis_prager/article/can_we_celebrate_the_death_of_evil_people_20110524/
Kevin Probst lives in Columbus, Georgia. He is an Associate Pastor of the Nazarene CrossPointe Church and teaches apologetics Calvary Christian School. He sends articles relating to theology, apologetics and Christian life. If you are interested in those ideas, visit his website at: http://www.kpprobst.blogspot.com and offer their opinions or join in the conversation.
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