Just War This is the notion that, in certain circumstances, war may be justified for reasons of personal, national or religious self-defense. With no direct New Testament scriptural support for the idea of a Just War, Catholic Tradition endorses it. St. Augustine supports the Just War on the basis of numerous holy wars portrayed in the Old Testament. The Middle Ages endorsed it in the Inquisitions. The most recent Catholic Catechism cites St. Thomas Aquinas in condoning killing as a legitimate form of self defense, be that personal or national (1995: p. 604). The contemporary understanding of the Just War is organized killing, when absolutely necessary, of other human beings on the wrong side of the religious or political fence. All peaceful solutions have failed, the enemy poses some kind of grand scale threat and there is a reasonable expectation of victory. Most theologians, for instance, would agree that Hitler simply had to be stopped. In Islam the notion of Jihad bespeaks the Just War. And in Hinduism, the Baghavad Gita endorses killing in keeping with one’s moral duty to uphold dharma. Meanwhile, Buddhist scriptures speak of peace and non-violence, and Buddhism is often hailed as a non-violent path. But Moojan Momen points out that scriptural, philosophical and folkloric justifications for violence exist in the Buddhist tradition (Moojan Momen, The Phenomenon of Religion: A Thematic Approach, Oxford: Oneworld, 1999, p. 410). Bernard Faure also says that Buddhist doctrine has often been adapted to justify war (Bernard Faure, “Buddhism and Violence,” Sangam.org, December 6, 2003). For more on world religions and violence, see “Collisions of Religion and Violence: Redux” at Crosscurrents.org, Summer 2001.
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