There are few modern foreign warriors that U.S Marines consider their equals, much less hold in awed esteem. But at the top of that short list are the Gurkhas.
Gurkhas are best known for their legendary exploits of bravery and tenacity while serving in the Indian Army’s Gorkha regiments and the British Army’s Brigade of Gurkhas. They are also famous for their large knife called the khukuri (see below). A Gurkha armed with a khukuri is not something you want to mess with—a lesson forty Indian thieves recently learned the hard way.
The band of about 40 robbers, some of whom were travelling as passengers, stopped the train in the Chittaranjan jungles in West Bengal around midnight. Shrestha– who had boarded the train at Ranchi in Jharkhand, the place of his posting–was in seat no. 47 in coach AC3.
“They started snatching jewelry, cell phones, cash, laptops and other belongings from the passengers,” Shrestha recalled. The soldier had somehow remained a silent spectator amidst the melee, but not for long. He had had enough when the robbers stripped an 18-year-old girl sitting next to him and tried to rape her right in front of her parents. He then took out his khukuri and took on the robbers.
“The girl cried for help, saying ´You are a soldier, please save a sister´,” Shrestha recalled. “I prevented her from being raped, thinking of her as my own sister,” he added. He took one of the robbers under control and then started to attack the others. He said the rest of the robbers fled after he killed three of them with his khukuri and injured eight others.
Having seen so many actions movies in which a lone hero takes on a band of villains, we Americans may be dulled to such an extraordinary act of heroism. But this didn’t take place on a Hollywood film set. This happened on a train in the Indian jungle.
One phenomenally courageous man, armed only with a knife, took on forty bandits to save a young girl from being violated. In a twenty minute melee in which he sustained a serious blade injury to his hand, Shrestha managed to kill three, injury eight, and scare off thirty other robbers.
God bless Bishnu Shresthai, a Samaritan with a khukuri.
(Via: Neatorama)
January 31st, 2011 | 9:23 am
The Gurkha motto: If they bring a gun to the fight, we bring a knife.
January 31st, 2011 | 9:27 am
The best part is, with all the Indians immigrating to the U.S., we could have our own ghurkas in another generation or two.
January 31st, 2011 | 10:08 am
The Gurkha motto: If they bring a gun to the fight, we bring a knife, *and we still kill them.
*corrected
January 31st, 2011 | 10:17 am
Hi
With respect to sean comment , the fact is gurkhas are not from india they are natives of nepal and they have mongoloid( asian) face , they serve in india , britain , brunei and singapore
My father was in british gurkha
January 31st, 2011 | 12:00 pm
In case any doubt remains, this is how a man acts.
January 31st, 2011 | 12:12 pm
I always like the story of the Good Samaritan but wondered what the story would have been like if the Samaritan showed up while the robbers were still there.
Now I know.
January 31st, 2011 | 12:55 pm
Years of rigorous training and dedication can do wonders for the mortal man. However, it takes true, innate bravery to do something like this. The courage that this guy showed is awe-inspiring.
January 31st, 2011 | 1:31 pm
I’m thankful that a young woman was spared the brutal violation of a gang rape, but just a day after the Revised Common Lectionary had millions of Christians across the world hearing again the first 12 verses of the Sermon on the Mount, which teach us about the radically different character of the blessings that Jesus came to proclaim, I have a hard time with Joe Carter’s invocation of God’s blessing for the violent and lethal attack on this young woman’s assailants.
As Christians, we either believe that God’s definitive revelation of the shape of his blessing came in Jesus Christ—not just his teachings, but his very life—or we don’t. “Blessed are the peacemakers, for they will be called children of God,” Jesus teaches in Matthew 5:9. And on February 20th we’ll hear Jesus going on with more of the same: “Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, so that you may be children of your Father in heaven; for he makes his sun rise on the evil and on the good, and sends rain on the righteous and on the unrighteous.”
If divine violence wasn’t necessary in the redemption of the world won by God in Christ’s crucifixion—wherein he suffered violence, to be sure, but refused to wield it—shouldn’t we be more careful in assuming God blesses particular forms of violence today? After all, as Jesus implies, if it’s irresponsible to refrain from using violence to bring a halt to the world’s evildoers—which is where conversations on this topic ultimately end up—then the biggest beef is not with people who take Jesus at his word and refuse to bless violence, but with God himself—”for he makes his sun rise on the evil and on the good, and sends rain on the righteous and on the unrighteous.” If God made his sun to rise on these evil assailants, why is Carter asking God to bless their violent deaths?
January 31st, 2011 | 1:45 pm
. . . I have a hard time with Joe Carter’s invocation of God’s blessing for the violent and lethal attack on this young woman’s assailants.
I wasn’t invoking a a blessing on the attack, but on the man who had the courage to defend the young woman in the face of what must have seemed to be his impending death.
As Christians, we either believe that God’s definitive revelation of the shape of his blessing came in Jesus Christ—not just his teachings, but his very life—or we don’t.
I completely agree, which is why I don’t think Jesus was an Anabaptist. This is, after all, the same Jesus who said, ““Do not think that I have come to bring peace to the earth. I have not come to bring peace, but a sword.”
After all, as Jesus implies, if it’s irresponsible to refrain from using violence to bring a halt to the world’s evildoers . . .
Contrary to the belief of the Anabapists, Jesus implies no such thing.
If God made his sun to rise on these evil assailants, why is Carter asking God to bless their violent deaths?
As I said, I did not ask God to “bless their violent deaths.”
What do you think should have been done in this circumstance? Do you think it would have been better for the girl to have been raped and other people possibly killed rather than for this soldier to defend them?
January 31st, 2011 | 1:48 pm
First, Gurkhas are Nepalese, not Indian, so the influx of Indians won’t get us any Gurkhas. That said, the British army is downsizing (again) which should leave quite a number of Gurkhas unemployed. I would be very pleased indeed to have several battalions of Gurkhas in our order of battle.
Legends of Gurkha loyalty and ferocity are legion. The very rumor that Gurkhas were advancing against them caused several regiments of Argentine soldiers in the Falkland Islands to flee from fortified positions that would have been very difficult for the British to assault.
Back during World War II, the British converted several battalions of Gurkhas to parachute infantry. During training, a number of Gurkhas preparing for their first jump were told that the plane would be flying at 600 feet. This caused some whispering in the ranks. The company sergeant major rose, saluted, and asked that the jump height be lowered to 300 feet. The British training officer replied that he did not think the parachutes would have enough time to open at just 300 feet. “Ah”, said the sergeant major. “We will be having parachutes. Thank you very much, Sahib”.
But my favorite Gurkha story concerns the Malayan insurgency of the 1950s, when Chinese communists were trying to take over the British colony. A group of Gurkhas ambused a Chicom guerrilla unit, wounding a high ranking communist officer. The Gurkha’s commander detailed two of the Gurkhas to carry the wounded man back to base. Off went the Gurkhas, with the guerrilla leader in an improvised litter. The rest of the unit swept the area, then returned to base, but the two Gurkhas with the guerrilla had not yet returned. Several hours later, they marched in, without the litter, but bearing a canvas bag, inside of which was the guerrilla leader’s head. The commanding officer inquired as to what happened to the man. “Well, Sahib”, explained one Gurkha, the man could not walk, he was very fat, and the hill was very steep”.
January 31st, 2011 | 2:15 pm
Gurkhas are serving in Afghanistan, I believe as part of the UK/NATO forces there. A news item today: “Prince Charles presented campaign medals to members of 1st Battalion The Royal Gurkha Rifles (1 RGR) who recently returned from six months in Helmand Province.”
I am not sure if this is an all-Indian, or Nepalese, or mixed company.
January 31st, 2011 | 2:23 pm
Joe,
Thanks for the reply. Here are the words you chose to place immediately prior your invocation of divine blessing:
“In a twenty minute melee in which he sustained a serious blade injury to his hand, Shrestha managed to kill three, injury eight, and scare off thirty other robbers.
God bless Bishnu Shresthai . . .”
If you didn’t mean to invoke a blessing on the violence, you might have considered writing this post differently.
What do I think should have been done? Or what would I have done? For all I know, I would have failed to show half the courage of Bishnu Shresthai. I might have cowered in the shadows and then had to live with the shame of failing to act when something might have been done to spare an innocent woman from such violation. I claim no moral superiority to this man, and I’m not interested in casting aspersions his way. I’m responding to your post, not his actions.
And you and I are talking about this event in the light of our Christian convictions. We’re talking about what God, the Father of Jesus Christ blesses. And while you might find it easier to avoid a straightforward reading of the Sermon on the Mount by glibly tossing around the label “Anabaptist” and making assertions without argument (incidentally, I’m a United Methodist, though I’ve certainly learned from Anabaptists on this topic), you’d be more persuasive if you dealt with the texts that I cited. As you’re aware, the Anabaptists didn’t preach the Sermon the Mount, Jesus did. And Jesus most certainly implied in the Sermon and with his very life that God is patient with evildoers; that a good human life fully lived—indeed the only complete instance of such a life—”knew no violence,” fulfilling the prophesy of Isaiah (53:9). It’s fine to know that you disagree with the Anabaptists, but it’d be better to know what’s wrong with any single claim I’ve made about the Sermon or about the life of Jesus. So you tell me, if humans are blameworthy for not using violence to stop evil, why isn’t God even more blameworthy for giving life and breath, rain and sunshine to evildoers?
In some situations, only miracles can prevent tragedies. I take it that this is what conservatives would say about the St. Joseph’s hospital situation in Phoenix, in which a nun and ethics consultant was excommunicated for endorsing the hospital’s plan to terminate a woman’s pregnancy lest both the woman and her unborn child die (the likelihood of which doctors had declared was approaching 100%). Sometimes the only morally worthy course of action does not succeed in preventing the loss of innocent life. I am not persuaded by the conservative interpretation of this particular incident, but it makes my point sufficiently well—we all believe that at times lives and values may not be saved by morally worthy actions.
Yet one can always try alternative courses of action and pray for and trust in the power of God to do surprising things. We don’t know that a nonviolent intervention would have worked in this situation in India, but neither do we know that it would have failed. It’s possible that a creative nonviolent intervention would not only have saved this woman from being raped but also have been used by God to so impress the assailants that they might have been won over to the way of Christ. Stranger, more wondrous, more miraculous things have happened.
Still, “success” in a conventional sense is never the definitive criterion for judging the morality of human acts. Rather, we must ask whether or not such acts conform to the truth made known in Christ. Please don’t tell me you think that is an Anabaptist claim. I would think it’s both evangelical and Catholic.
January 31st, 2011 | 3:03 pm
Charlie Collier’s comments make me sad. He infers that Jesus’ comments about prayer for one’s enemies and not hating them justify passivity in the face of great evil. Jesus’ non-resistance to His crucifixion was a unique event in history; for this purpose, as He said, He was born – to become the atoning sacrifice for our sins. Using His willing death for our sins as a template for every response to physical violence is exposition of the worst kind. When John the Baptist was approached by soldiers who asked how they should repent, John told then not to lay down their arms but not to extort from those over whom they had charge. Jesus did not call on the centurion whose daughter He healed to resign his commission but honored his great faith. And so on, throughout the New Testament. The Gurkha soldier who defended the helpless by fighting their attackers demonstrated the truth that one of God’s ordained functions for the state is to bear the sword, and “not … in vain” (Romans 13). Peacemaking sometimes necessitates militant resistance to violence. I might turn my cheek; I have no theological right or biblical mandate to remain idle when the vulnerable are having theirs slashed.
January 31st, 2011 | 6:13 pm
Got pulled here by a Google session and feel compelled to comment. Briefly, I think there’s a false dichotomy being drawn here between pacifism and action. Being a Christian means following the teachings of Jesus consistently over the broad arc of his life – and it is clear from the gospel (and from the few prooftexts ripped out of contrast in arguments to the contrary) that nonviolence is at the heart of that teaching (as Mr. Collier correctly points out).
That doesn’t mean not doing anything. It means proclaiming Christ in our actions and our deeds – stepping in the middle of the fight with our own bodies, talking to the attacker, other creative ways to de-escalate conflict. It means not harming another human being even when the kingdom of this world tells us it seems logical, easy, or even noble to do so.
January 31st, 2011 | 6:56 pm
Jane, whoever you are,
I am asking you a question that you are still in the pond like a frog and never come out;
. If you do not know the Gurkhas and indians then, you might not know the two footed animals and human, are you ? Go to folkstone Army camp and find out yourself. If you want to know me, leave another comment, I will give you address.
January 31st, 2011 | 7:01 pm
Charlie Collier, it is love to turn the other cheek when you’ve been struck, but it is cowardice to turn the other cheek when your neighbor is being struck.
The Gurkha soldier was in fact a “peace”maker i.e. a shalom maker. The Hebrew word Jesus used there means wholeness, completeness, nothing missing, nothing broken. By protecting the girl from abuse and protecting the passengers from robbery and mayhem he was indeed being a shalom maker.
Greg Marquez
January 31st, 2011 | 7:05 pm
Rob,
Who said anything about passivity in the face of violent aggression? I didn’t, except to confess the possibility of my own cowardice in such a situation, which is obviously not to recommend it. I asked, rather, that we consider the possibility of nonviolent intervention, which, had it been effective, would have had the advantage over what actually happened of preserving the lives of three human beings made in the image of God, for whom Christ died, and to whom the Gospel might yet have been preached. Of course, it might have failed, but then again, this courageous man’s efforts might also have failed and left him dead in addition to the victim.
Using substitutionary atonement theory to dodge Jesus’ own summons to cruciform discipleship amounts to an avoidance of an honest reading of the New Testament. Jesus consistently told his disciples they would need to take up their crosses and suffer on his account.
Also, an important correction: Jesus says to “love your enemies” and to “pray for those who persecute you.” If you want to make a case for killing enemies as the way to loving them, I’m willing to consider it. The hurdle to this exposition is quite high, for we have it on good authority that “This is how we know what love is: Jesus Christ laid down his life for us” (1 John 3:16 NIV).
As to your final point, Why is God remaining idle while evil people kill innocent people every day? This is among the many problems with the way this argument all too predictably unfolds—your way of framing the issue generates theodical problems. It puts God in the dock, for who is more powerful and just and capable of defending the innocent from unjust aggression than God? And yet the innocent die at the hands of evildoers, every day.
January 31st, 2011 | 10:01 pm
Charlie,
It is possible for us to use force to defend ourselves without intending any harm on our attacker.
So long as our intention is only to defend ourselves or others from attack, and our actions are appropriate to this aim, then whatever harm the attacker may suffer is a result of his own wrongful, aggressive action.
February 1st, 2011 | 6:52 am
“I am not sure if this is an all-Indian, or Nepalese, or mixed company.”
Gurkha battalions are recruited exclusively in Nepal. There are no “Indian” units in the British army, and while there are seven Gurkha battalions in the Indian army (called “Goorkha Rifles), there are no Indian army forces under ISAF in Afghanistan.
February 1st, 2011 | 10:50 am
Charlie Collier
I want to make sure I understand your position. Do you think our fighting the Nazis in WWII was legitimate? They, after all, never attacked us as had the Japanese.
If you think we were on the side of right in WWII in resisting evil and defending the defenseless, how would that be different from what this brave man did on the train in a much more fast-moving and immediately violent situation?
February 1st, 2011 | 11:39 am
Charlie:
(1) Of course we should consider non-violent intervention. Usually, it fails. Thus, we must be prepared to defend the weak by stopping, through harsh force, their attackers. In the moment, these things happen with immediacy and rapid succession. I am not advocating the objectification of anyone: Murderers are made by God, loved by Him, and need to be stopped. As Carl Henry wrote, not to resist evil is an act of Christian lovelessness.
(2) I dodge nothing. Your analogy – that the sacrificial atonement is the sole model for Christian conduct – is inadequate. There are times when non-resistance is the only moral option; not resisting arrest, detention, incarceration and martyrdom have been the pattern from Paul to Wurmbrand to, now, Asia Bibby, and one we should uphold with honor and prayer. What you seem rather insistently to refuse to consider is the need for militant defense of the weak.
(3) “Love your enemies by killing them:” Oh, come, brother – you debase yourself by using language like that. Those I would kill in the defense of the vulnerable are not “my” enemies – they are the enemies, the likely killers, of innocent image-bearers of God. Their potential deaths at my hands should be a cause of grief, but not reluctance to defend – “to the knife” – those in jeopardy.
(4) Don’t hide behind God’s sovereign work in the world as a pretext for human inaction. How He will weave His final just judgment together with the apparent injustices of the world (having traveled extensively throughout India and ministered to the sexually-trafficked women of Mumbai, I am not unmindful of such) is up to Him. What is up to us is to agents of His love and truth – and sometimes, that means using a knife on those who would rape, maim, or murder.
Rob Schwarzwalder
February 1st, 2011 | 12:53 pm
Stuart Koehl, thanks for the clarification, that Gurkhas are exclusively from Nepal. But, if so, in what capacity would Gurkhas be serving in Afghanistan, and why would Prince Charles offer them recognition? Who are the “1st Battalion The Royal Gurkha Rifles (1 RGR)”? I checked the Afghanistan International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) website, and among the 50 or so countries listed contributing to ISAF, Nepal is not included. So the “1 RGR” who just served in Helmand must be (i) not really Ghurkas; or (2) somehow affiliated with ISAF, apparently through some kind of link to the UK? But, Nepal is not listed as a member of the British Commonwealth, either. There are a number of positive news stories on the Gurkhas in Afghanistan (they were praised by General Petraeus, for example), but it is still not clear to me the capacity in which they serve. Thanks to FT for the blog post with the admirable example of the Gurkha warrior ethic of protecting the innocent.
February 1st, 2011 | 1:53 pm
Jane
I think what Stuart was saying is that the Gurkhas are not Indian either nationally or ethnically. They are of Nepalese origin.
The unit they serve in is part of the British forces in ISAF. More here
http://www.army.mod.uk/infantry/regiments/royal-gurkha-rifles/default.aspx
February 1st, 2011 | 2:51 pm
One way to put it is the Gurkhas are mercenaries in the very best sense of the word: they are professional warriors who enlist in the armies of countries not their own (India and the United Kingdom), and loyal serve those states, fighting their wars in return for honor, glory and, of course, pay. The loyalty and courage of the Gurkhas is legendary, and the bond between them and their officers, British and Indian alike, very close to mutual love.
February 1st, 2011 | 6:55 pm
I believe the text here is, “Whatsoever you did for the least of my brothers….”
I don’t seem to recall Jesus repudiating all the heroes of Israel whom He Himself had given strong arms and fighting skill, and sent out to fight for His people.
February 1st, 2011 | 7:22 pm
Suppose the following happened instead:
Joe Carter (or Stuart Koehl) was in a very similar situation as Bishnu Shresthai. Joe decided to fight the 40 armed robbers as well to protect the innocent.
Sadly and unfortunately, Joe gets killed defending the innocent. None of the armed robbers gets killed by Joe. All the witnesses said that they saw Joe get killed promptly upon trying to valiantly intervene.
Joe’s widow and the surviving witnesses and the victimized girl and her parents all say that Joe died a hero, and some wondered about the wisdom or foolishness of Joe for carrying out such a suicidal counter-attack to defend the innocent.
Point?
#1. We may not be hearing of this story if the result wasn’t so utterly amazing.
#2. I guess it matters in some way whether the hero lives or dies. In this case, the hero lives to tell the tale. In the hypothetical, Joe Carter dies heroically and some folks may question whether he was stupid to take on such great odds and died for nothing if the girl got raped anyways.
February 1st, 2011 | 7:50 pm
Kudos to my fellow Gorkhali brother. We Nepalese are the best and we should always help others in need. Btw the Gurkha soldier wasnt christian or jew or even muslim. He was either Hindu or Buddhist. I am from ktm and i have seen videos of him celebrating in Nepalese traditional ways, so no need to discuss about who is what. coz i see alotta discussion pertaining to christ and god. this is about this brave chap and Nepalese not about no religion.
Btw the Nepalese motto Gurkhas use is Better dies, than to live with shame.
Jay Gorakhnath.
February 1st, 2011 | 8:07 pm
If a Soldier ever tells you he is not afraid – he is either a liar – or a Gurhka!
February 1st, 2011 | 9:14 pm
>>and it is clear from the gospel (and from the few prooftexts ripped out of contrast in arguments to the contrary) that nonviolence is at the heart of that teaching (as Mr. Collier correctly points out)
Not among orthodox Christians. And why did Christ command his disciples to have swords? (see Luke) For kitchen work?
February 2nd, 2011 | 4:12 am
To those who have chosen to turn this into a religious issue…..Charlie and Jeremy….and a few others. As a soldier of 26 years I applaud the actions of this single very brave warrior. I wish there were so many more like him and there would be fewer of those that we so often read about spreading violence worldwide. I unfortunately am not Christ like nor can I be when I have seen first hand the violence visited on others in the name of religion, self interest, greed and whatever reason one wishes to use. Some people deserve killing. I’ll not get into a philosophical discussion on how that assignment is made. There are many quotes out there that aptly state the obvious, though I do have my favorites…”for those who fight for it, freedom has a flavor the protected will never know” and my favorite “People sleep peaceably in their beds at night, only because rough men stand ready to do violence on their behalf”. God Bless our men and women in uniform and God Bless Bishnu Shresthai ……very well put Joe Carter.
February 2nd, 2011 | 8:49 am
David Gray:
“Not among orthodox Christians. And why did Christ command his disciples to have swords? (see Luke) For kitchen work?”
Possibly! IIRC, the word used in Greek translations of that passage generally referred to a tool/weapon with a heavy blade and single edge. It was very similar to the Gurkha’s Khukuri, but ironically, that doesn’t necessarily mean that Jesus was thinking of combat. As Joe’s post shows, the Khukuri can be a fearsome weapon, but similar knives with the same name are all-purpose tools for Nepalese people. Think also of the multiple uses of machetes in Africa and Latin America — the “sword” in Luke seems to have been a similar multi-purpose instrument.
So, was Jesus telling his disciples to take along swords for combat (why only two for twelve guys?) or telling them to take their camping equipment? If there’s insufficient context in that passage, we’ll need to take into account Jesus’s other teachings.
February 2nd, 2011 | 8:53 am
Sean: I didn’t know that the Patels were Ghurkas. :)
February 2nd, 2011 | 10:12 am
Points:
1) When Jesus asked the Disciples if they had swords, and they answer “Two,” he said “It is enough.” Enough to make fools of themselves. Enough to cut some poor guy’s ear off, which then provided Jesus the opportunity to heal it.
2) The Disciples were sent out with swords later, not to cook, but to offer protection against run-of-the-mill dangers: wolves, lions, and yes, robbers, but this was defensive, not offensive use of the tools.
3) The Gurkha in today’s story was using the weapon defensively against robbers, and although their numbers raised the threat above run-of-the-mill violence, it still is not risen to the level of war.
4) The theological points raised by both sides in this discussion point to a fundamental divide between Christians who are too reluctant to use defensive violence and those too quick to expouse redemptive violence. Redemptive violence is the theological (and heretical) belief that violence will save humanity from the mess we are in. No! Only cruciform discipleship following the teachings of Jesus and his example on the Cross.
The original article is right to laud the Gurkha for bravery in the defense of an innocent, but it begs the question of the author’s deeper intent.
February 2nd, 2011 | 10:25 am
“When Jesus asked the Disciples if they had swords, and they answer “Two,” he said “It is enough.” Enough to make fools of themselves. Enough to cut some poor guy’s ear off, which then provided Jesus the opportunity to heal it.”
He also instructed them to sell their cloaks and buy swords, so life is not as simple as you would have it.
“The Disciples were sent out with swords later, not to cook, but to offer protection against run-of-the-mill dangers: wolves, lions, and yes, robbers, but this was defensive, not offensive use of the tools”
To have a sword, and yet be unwilling to use it, is to carry a two pound paperweight at one’s hip. A sword might deter, but should deterrence fail, one must be willing to fight. If one is willing to fight, one must be willing to kill. One might be willing to suffer death one’s self (in the Eastern Church, the examples are Saints Boris and Gleb the Passion Bearers), but one has no right to choose death for others, particularly those who either depend on one for protection, or who have no capacity to defend one’s self).
“The Gurkha in today’s story was using the weapon defensively against robbers, and although their numbers raised the threat above run-of-the-mill violence, it still is not risen to the level of war.”
I think the Gurkha, whose ethics are not your, would disagree.
“The theological points raised by both sides in this discussion point to a fundamental divide between Christians who are too reluctant to use defensive violence and those too quick to expouse redemptive violence. Redemptive violence is the theological (and heretical) belief that violence will save humanity from the mess we are in.”
Violence is never redemptive. War is never just. Sometimes they are necessary. But it is beauty that will save the world.
February 2nd, 2011 | 11:53 am
And while this one brave man was taking on 40 robbers, what did all the cowards on the train do?
I submit that they may not have been worth saving.
February 2nd, 2011 | 1:11 pm
“And while this one brave man was taking on 40 robbers, what did all the cowards on the train do?”
Bee Gees Theme Song is blaring:
“Stayin’ Alive! Stayin’ Alive!”
February 2nd, 2011 | 1:21 pm
I believe that the fact that even two of the disciples of Jesus had swords is what is significant. Swords were not used to chop wood or cut bread, it was used for one thing, as weapons against predators, whether animal or human. If Jesus was alive today, it would be like two of his disciples carrying pistols. Jesus was, I believe a peaceful man, but not a pacifist. His acceptance of the swords carried by his disciples and his admonition in Luke, ch.22, verse 36, that when he was gone, if you did not have a sword, then sell your cloak to buy one one, says it all.
February 2nd, 2011 | 1:45 pm
Stuart,
tell me, were you agreeing or disagreeing with me. I couldn’t quite tell.
“Violence is never redemptive.” I agree wholeheartedly. But the trouble is that the belief in redemptive violence is the real faith of most of the world. Christ came to show us a better way.
Police, guards, soldiers in wars of national defense (or wars to defend nations with which we have treaty obligations), or, as in the story, civilians who step forward to save innocent life, all these are justifiable uses of defensive violence, and, yes, you have to be prepared to kill. But the problem is that defensive violence never breaks the cycle of violence. There has to be more.
A litmus test for this issue is found by asking how a theologian reads Romans 13. Many take it as a justification of violence, not merely to restrain evil persons, or to protect the innocent, but to purge the world of evil. The correct reading is to acknowledge the role of the sword to restrain violent people, but the better way is to “put on the armor of light” (Verse 13:12).
February 2nd, 2011 | 7:52 pm
Fascinating discussion. Thank you all for your thoughts.
February 3rd, 2011 | 12:15 am
It is better to die then to be a coward…..Gurkha Prove
February 3rd, 2011 | 12:19 am
“First, Gurkhas are Nepalese, not Indian, so the influx of Indians won’t get us any Gurkhas ”
Not true. The Gorkhas in the IA are comprised of both Gorkhas from India and Nepal. There is a significant Gorkha population in India as well. They are also part of the Indian army and serve in various regiments. Of course, we also recruit Gorkhas of Nepalese origin as well.
February 3rd, 2011 | 8:04 am
We are taught that God retains the evil will of the devil within limits by violence: we are not given a picture of God permitting to the devil all that he is capable of. There is current a conception of Christianity as having revealed that the defeat of evil must always be by pure love without coercion; this at least is shown to be false by the foregoing consideration. And without the alleged revelation there could be no reason to believe such a thing.
February 3rd, 2011 | 10:03 am
[...] One soldier, with a knife, against 40 armed thieves Result: Thieves – 3 dead, 8 injured. Soldier – a serious wound on his hand. This is one reason why the notion that banning objects, such as 30 round magazines, with the intention of curbing acts of evil, is flawed. Humans have the uncanny ability to utilize available tools, combine them with courageous virtue – or evil desire – and act. [...]
February 3rd, 2011 | 1:25 pm
Let’s suppose that it was a Mennonite Pacifist’s daughter that was about to be imminently raped, and possibly killed, by the debauched criminals.
A non-Pacifist Christian saves the daughter from this imminent event by forceful and violent defense, a defense which resulted in the death(s) of her attackers.
Do the Mennonite Pacifist parents reject the use of violence to save their daughter?
February 8th, 2011 | 3:52 am
@shishir
Gurkhas are natives of nepal and they dont look like indians , after 1947 some part of nepal (east) were given to india so the ppl there do have indian citizen but truely they speak nepalese and follow there traditional nepalese culture and they say they are nepalese , nepal is a mix of races of tibeto burmese( mongoloid) and aryans ( indians ) but the one who fought in wold wars were of tibeto burmese and they were true gurkhas, when british came to take volunteers every villages of these races went straight to fight but the aryans of nepal hide and never went as u can see the pictures of gurkhas of world wars all were asian face , after 1947 britain took 4 battallion india took around 10 battalion , singapore took 1 battalion and brunei also keeps 1 battalion after 1960′s , In world war almost 2 million indians went i think only one got victoria cross but gurkhas were only 200,000 and they won 24 victoria cross and countless othere medals ,
February 8th, 2011 | 5:33 pm
[...] you could probably discern from my recent post about the Gurkha and the forty thieves, I’m absolutely fascinated by examples of modern-day heroism. Such stories strike against the [...]
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