The New Testament is not exactly subtle about encouraging or prescribing peace (Matthew 5:8, James 3:17-18), depending on the verse. Paul even lists peace among the fruits of the Spirit in Galatians 5:22 as an evidence that someone is not living for sin—though there are still logically and Biblically erroneous ways to regard or pursue peace, like doing so for the sake of emotionalism or tolerance of evil. Yet, one broadly accepted idea is that the Old Testament promotes a form of arrogant or harmful disunity, while the New Testament "overrides" or "corrects" this. This is not so. The New Testament does declare that discord and dissensions can be signs that someone is wicked and devoted to their own selfish disregard for God and morality (Galatians 5:19-21). So does the Old Testament.
There are not only six or seven things that are evil and hence detestable, but Proverbs 6 includes a person who stirs up conflict as one of the things God hates. The sinner and the sin alike are despised.
Stirring up genuinely needless, unwarranted strife is irrational and morally analogous to but not as evil as killing someone without justification. Yes, there are many justifications provided in the Torah for putting someone to death due to what certain sins objectively deserve, though there are still many ways to kill someone illicitly and thus be guilty of murder. Gratuitously aggressive conversations or attitudes obviously would not be as wicked as something like murder, but conflict-stirring behaviors and killing both should be limited to particular circumstances, and even then, there are ways to err even when basic strife or killing are required or acceptable. According to Proverbs 6, God hates not just unecessary interpersonal strife, but also those who unrepentantly promote it.
The New Testament does not introduce anything new or amend the particulars of the Bible's moral philosophy when it does speak of pursuing peace as an obligatory thing. No, actions that establish or could facilitate peace between personal enemies or opposing nations are overtly mentioned among the universal requirements of morality in the Law (Exodus 23:4-5, Deuteronomy 20:10). But according to the Old Testament there are of course times where seeking peace is neither mandatory nor permissible. And the New Testament absolutely does not say anything contradictory about the matter.
You do not have to pursue peace inflexibly or relentlessly to be righteous. Ecclesiastes 3 says there is a time for war and a time for peace. The general populations of the Promised Land deserved merciless slaughter because of their egregious sins (Deuteronomy 9:4-6), some of which are detailed in places like Leviticus 20:1-23 and Deuteronomy 18:9-13. To make peace with them would in fact have been the immoral course of action (Exodus 34:12-16, Deuteronomy 7:1-5, 20:16-18), though the Torah prescribes peacable actions in other contexts as clarified above. As for the New Testament, Jesus himself claims that he did not come to bring peace to those who oppose the truth (Matthew 10:34-36, Luke 12:49-53) even as he calls peacemakers blessed (Matthew 5:8). Discord due to one party holding to truth (such as, on Christianity, the truth of the gospel) is only wrong for the other party.
There are simply ways in which seeking or avoiding peace can be evil. Someone bent on producing conflict not for the sake of honoring the truth, hating falsity, or opposing irrational people, but for personal satisfaction or to manipulate a situation to carry out some other sin, is vile. A traitor to both reason and morality, this person is an abomination because their intentions and actions are abominable, detestable as Proverbs 6 puts it in the NIV. The words of Jesus, Paul, and James in New Testament writings do not suddenly depart from the Old Testament to condemn aversion to peace. Yahweh always hated baseless or egoistic conflict.
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