"I Did Not Come To Bring Peace, But A Sword"

It is foolish to claim that the Bible portrays Jesus as someone who emphasizes peace above all else, for he is said to have done precisely the opposite.  In Matthew 10:34, he is literally quoted as saying that his coming was not something that would foster immediate peace between even members of the same family: "Do not think that I came to bring peace to the earth.  I did not come to bring peace, but a sword."  He continues to say that his coming would turn parents and their children against each other to the point of the members of the same household being enemies.

There are also other comments of Jesus that go beyond affirming the inevitability of conflict between sincere Christians and hostile outsiders.  The Jesus of the New Testament even affirms the divine command to execute children who incorrigibly indulge in destructive or hedonistic lifestyles (see Deuteronomy 21:18-21 and Matthew 15:3-9), so he cannot rightly be said to be opposed to all killings.  The Biblical Jesus here and elsewhere is neither a pacifist nor an Ares; he is clearly a more multifaceted figure than the misleadingly simplistic conceptions of him put forth by many conservative and liberal theologians.

In Revelation 19, Jesus appears as a warrior, a sword coming from his mouth and his robe exhibiting a red color after being dipped in blood.  Even if Revelation 19 described theological truths or eschatological events in a mostly nonliteral way, it would still be the case that Revelation presents Jesus as willing to shed the blood of his enemies.  The Jesus of Revelation, once again, is perfectly consistent with the Jesus of Matthew 10:34 who denies that he came to bring peace to the world.

It is nonetheless true that God is not said to hope for people to remain his enemies, nor is he said to delight in the damnation of the wicked (Ezekiel 33:11).  Yahweh prefers for all people to voluntarily turn to him (2 Peter 3:8-9).  Jesus, who claims to represent Yahweh, would not contradict this preference, but he never says anything even suggesting that the absence of conflict is therefore worth striving for above all else.  If he did, he would only be advancing a major non sequitur fallacy.

All the same, it is asinine to regard the Biblical Jesus as a pacifist, for he is openly associated with relational conflict, animosity within families, and the killing of those who commit the capital crimes of Mosaic Law.  Peace is the end on the Christian worldview, as it will be inevitable when morally purified individuals populate New Jerusalem and the unsaved have been reduced to nonexistence in hell [1].  However, peace is not the means.  It is at best something to be tossed aside when it is necessary to correct those who care for nothing that infringes on their sense of emotional security and stability.


[1].  https://thechristianrationalist.blogspot.com/2017/02/the-truth-of-annihilationism.html