Deconstructing Romans 13: Verse 1-2
Nekeisha Alexis-Manners

"Let every soul be subject to the governing authorities. For there is no authority except from God, and the authorities that exist are appointed by God" -Gideons International Bible

"Everyone must submit himself to the governing authorities, for there is no authority except that which God has established. The authorities that exist have been established by God." - NIV

INTRODUCTION

Obey the law of the land. When dealing with the question of obedience or disobedience to the state, this is the standard Christian response. The only time disobedience is allowed is when the ruling of the government is in direct conflict with the word of God. Otherwise, we are bound by a Christian duty to do what the state says. Despite a New Testament filled with disobedient disciples and a disobedient Messiah in Christ, Romans 13 is the only reason for this strong belief in and support of the state. Perhaps this faith is misplaced, however, due to an incorrect reading of the first verses of that chapter.

CONTEXT

Romans 13, is more of a continuation of Romans 12 than most Christians realize. Chapter 12 describes how we as Christians are called to interact with the rest of the world. We are called to "present [our] bodies as a living sacrifice to God" (v. 1), to avoid conformity (v. 2) and to be humble (v. 3). The body of Christ is also described and its members are encouraged to use the spiritual gifts they've been given for the benefit of the Church (v. 4-8) characteristics we should have including love and affection are outlined (v. 9-13). The key portion of Romans 12 that carries over into Romans 13 is how Christians are called to deal with persecution. As believers in Christ, Christ demands that we offer only blessings to those that wish us harm. We are not to seek revenge on those that harm us, but God asks us to pursue the difficult task of doing good to those who commit evil against us. The chapter ends with the words "do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good." Keep all of this in mind as you read on.

Like the scriptural context of Chapter 12, the historical context is also very important. Paul is writing to the church at a time when Christ's people are being persecuted at the hands of the law. One can imagine the climate of fear and anger, and the sense of retaliation that must have been in people's minds. In Romans 12, Paul's words are a caution against the use of revolutionary violence towards the state. They are not to commit the same evil and inflict the same punishment that the government uses against them. Rather Christians are to bless them and do good in return. It is in this vein that Romans 13 begins.

SUBJECT/SUBMIT

Before we get into the heart of Romans 13 v. 1, let's look at the meaning of the words submit and subject. According to the New Lexicon version of the Oxford Dictionary, the verb form of these words (which is what is being referred to in the text) is as follows:

subject - to cause to submit; to cause to undergo
submit - to cause to undergo; to offer oneself of one's free will [to submit oneself to an ordeal]; to cease to offer resistance.

As we can see, to subject or to submit does not mean to obey. In fact, obey means to act in conformity with and as I mentioned earlier in Romans 12, to be in conformity with anything or anyone beside God is sinful. As such the first misreading of Romans 13 comes from a simple vocabulary mistake! According to the meanings of these two words, the first part of the verse in question should be as follows:

"Let every soul offer oneself of one's own free will to undergo an ordeal by the governing authorities."

By the very meaning of the words themselves, the first and most quoted verse in Romans 13 is not a call to obedience. In fact verse 1 is reinforced by the 2nd verse which also says not to resist the government. Instead, Paul is asking the people willingly offer themselves up for persecution for Jesus' sake in the same way that Jesus instructs his people to do in the sermon on the mount: "Blessed are you when they revile you and persecute you, and speak all kinds of evil against you for my name's sake" (Matthew 5 v. 11).

GOVERNING AUTHORITIES

The second order of business when dealing with Romans 13 is to describe what the Word says about the governing authorities in the first place. In the Old Testament, 1 Samuel ch. 8 marks the beginning of authority as we know it today. The common belief that modern government began with Mosaic Law is simply not true. As theologian Jacques Ellul writes in his book Anarchy and Christianity, the legacy of Moses concerning ruling was quite different:

"As already sketched out, perhaps by Moses, the people settled by clans and tribes. The 12 tribes all had their own heads, but they had little concrete authority. When an important decision had to be made,, with ritual sacrifices and prayers for divine inspiration, a popular assembly was held and this had the last word" (italics added).

This doesn't sound like the top down authority of a state or a king. Rather it sounds more like the communal decision-making process that the early church probably took part in. In 1 Samuel however, the people ask for government in the form of a king so that they could be like other nations. It is important to note two things here: 1- if such an institution had existed during the time of Moses, there would be no need for the people to ask for it, reinforcing the observation I made earlier. 2- God's response to the people's request is essential to understanding His position on government. He says to Samuel:

"'Listen to all that the people are saying to you; it is not you they have rejected but they have rejected me as their king as they have done from the day I brought them out of Egypt until this day, forsaking me for other gods, so they are doing to you'" (italics added).

The desire of the Israelites for a government other than the leading of God is considered an outright rejection of Him. Furthermore, it is classified on the same lines as idolatry because He considers it serving another god.

Flash forward to the New Testament. Perhaps the biggest argument against government can be found in Christ's encounter with Satan during His temptation. Satan offers three things to Christ, to ease his hunger and break his fast, to test the protection of the Father . . . and to take possession of the kingdoms of the earth. How Christians overlook this, including myself, is beyond me. After showing Christ all the kingdoms of the world -- a reference to all earthly rule -- Satan says this, "'I will give you all their authority and splendor, for it was given to me and I give it to anyone I want to'" (italics added).

It has been asserted that since Satan is the Father of Lies, he is probably lying concerning the amount of control he has over the governments of the world, but the every nature of the encounter between Christ and Satan begs to differ. There are instances in the New Testament when Christ is very candid about who is a hypocrite and who is a liar. In this case, He is, standing in front of the king of all lies who is telling Him that he owns the nations of the world from the top down and what is Christ's response? Jesus doesn't call Him a liar. He doesn't even refute Satan's statement". Rather he accepts what Satan says and merely responds saying, "'Worship the Lord your God and serve Him only". This is a clear indication that all authority on this earth that is not led by God himself belongs to Satan. As such, the question at hand is, why in the world would God instruct us to obey it? The answer is that he doesn't. With God, there is no, "obey the government, except when it disobeys Me". There is only serve God, without regard for the institutions that God has allowed Satan to control on this earth.

AUTHORITY FROM GOD

It is believed by most American Christians, again based on Romans 13, that God is not only in charge of government (usually only the American government at that), but that He also supports, agrees with and sanctions all that they do. In order to make this assertion, they usually turn to the latter part of verse 1, which reads, "For there is no authority except from God, and the authorities that exist are appointed by God". We must break this down as well to get to the true meaning of that statement.

"For there is no authority except from God" This is a given. Nothing in this world can be given any power unless God gives the okay. Even Satan's power is allowed to exist and function on a limited basis by God as seen in the case of Job where Satan literally has to ask permission to persecute the righteous man. Not only that but in Revelations ch. 20 4, 7-8, after Satan is thrown into a bottomless pit, God will release him from his prison and allow him to "go out and deceive the nations which are in the four corners of the earth". However, just because God allows Satan to exist and wreak havoc, doesn't mean that they are on the same team. Another way to look at this is to think about evil. Just because evil has dominion on earth, doesn't mean that God himself is evil. In the same way, the fact that God authorizes government on the earth doesn't mean that he agrees with it or ordains it.

This is reiterated in the second part of the statement, "and the authorities that exist are appointed by God". Again, we need to look at vocabulary to clear up the current misunderstanding of the text. Appointment is not the same as agreement. In fact the meaning of appoint is as follows:

appoint - to select for an office or position, to set; to choose

God chose Pharaoh as the king that would deliberately ignore his warnings to release his people. In fact on more than one occasion He purposefully closed Pharaoh 's ears to His words. That doesn't mean that Pharaoh and God were bosom buddies, or that Pharaoh would go unpunished for his role in keeping the Israelites enslaved. As stated by John Howard Yoder in the book The Politics of Jesus when writing about Romans 13:

"God is not said to create or institute or ordain the powers that be, but to order them, to put them in order . . .to tell them where they belong, what is their place"

The sanctification of government as a holy entity by God is completely absent in these verses. Existence is not enough to command holiness. As a result, government simply is - nothing more and nothing less.

CONCLUSION

So what does this all mean? Basically, there is not enough Biblical evidence in verses 1 and 2 of Romans 13 to support the popular belief that Christians have a duty to obey the government. Obedience is not mentioned here once, nor is the belief that government and God are best friends — rather, they are opposing forces. What the verses do show is that the Christian's obligation is only to accept the persecution that is brought on by government or any other enemy as the Christians in China are doing today and the Apostles did throughout the New Testament. They are a call to follow in the footsteps of Jesus who, despite His innocence and the power He had to destroy all those who participated in His crucifixion, allowed Himself to be destroyed. Where God is concerned, to be His is to be a slave to righteousness, obeying Him and Him alone. The law of the land is disregarded in our daily lives. If following God is within the guidelines of the state, then that is all well and good. Similarly, if a call from God does not fit in the letter of that law, that is also fine. Neither instance matters to those who are committed to Him because, in the end, our responsibility is to God and God alone.

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APPENDIX
1 Peter 2 v. 13

When Romans 13 is interpreted against its traditional meaning, 1 Peter 2 v. 13 is usually used by supporters of obedience to the government as a trump card. As a result, I included a short analysis of 1 Peter to illustrate how it reinforces this "new" interpretation of Romans 13, rather than contradicts it.

There are several similarities between 1 Peter and Romans 13. Like Paul, Peter is writing to the church at a time when they are undergoing persecution by the governing authorities. Peter tells the people that, in this time, they should not conform (v.14 - same as Romans 12 v.2), stresses the importance of keeping their faith (v.7-8 - same as Romans 12 v. 11-13) and encourages them to love (v.22, ch. 2 v.17 - same as Romans 12 v.9). Much of the first chapter is spent congratulating the church because they are maintaining their faith in Christ "though now for a while . . . you have been grieved by various trials" (v.6), and urges them to continue persisting. It is in this spirit that we go into second chapter of Peter.

In order to understand 1 Peter 2 v. 13, it is critical that one understands the verses 11-25. In this section of the chapter, Peter's main focus is to instruct the people to do good in the face of evil, just as Romans 12 14-21 does. Peter is echoing Paul's command to overcome the evil they are facing with good. Peter states in ch. 2 v. 12 that they should do good works so that evildoers will observe them and they should glorify God when it is their time to be persecuted. The purpose for doing this is not to show obedience to the government, but to expose their hypocrisy and to "silence the ignorance of foolish and ignorant men" (v. 15). [Take note here: Peter is calling the government ignorant and foolish!] By abstaining from any wrongdoing against Christ's commands and not resisting any suffering that comes their way, their actions will be "commendable before God" (v. 21). By doing good, their persecutors will not be able to justify the violence they are using against innocent people in the same way that those who killed Christ and caused him to suffer will not. The heart of what Peter is trying to convey to the church can be found in ch. 2 v. 19-21 — not in v. 13. His command is not obey the government. He is stressing what Paul said and what Jesus commanded on the sermon on the mount - Blessed are the you when they revile you and persecute you and speak evil against you for my name's sake. In fact, v. 23 in 1 Peter ch. 2 is a direct reference to that.

The same problem of misinterpreting the word "submit" is also the reason for a misunderstanding of Peter. As I have said before, the word does not mean to obey, so the assertion that "submit" here is different from the true meaning of "submit" in Romans makes little sense. Peter is telling the church to willingly take part in the persecution that comes their way. Like Romans 13, 1 Peter is not a call to obedience to government. It is a call to follow Christ's footsteps by not resisting suffering for the name of God.
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Nekeisha Alexis-Manners is currently a senior at New York University majoring in African Studies. She is also a web designer (she designed www.jesusradicals.com) and works part-time at a recreational program for the mentally disabled.