Submit to the Military Authority? Reading Rom 13:1-7 in Myanmar
When people think of Christianity and politics or Church and State, they ordinarily think of Christian responses to “Trump” or “Roe vs. Wade.”
However, the bee in my bonnet is pointing out that the political issues facing Christians today are far bigger than the American political binary with its parochial problems.
If we think globally, then, the churches of the world are facing political challenges and questions that would never occur to most Christians in the West. Think of Christians in China, Nigeria, Ukraine, Israel, Palestine, Taiwan, Argentina, Thailand, Egypt, Nicaragua, and the challenges they face. There’s a lot more going on around the world besides annoying MAGA devotees and nauseating Woke activists.
Here’s where I recommend an article by Dr. David Moe and Prof. James Scott:
“Reading Romans 13:1–7 as a Hidden Transcript of Public Theology: A Dialogue between James C. Scott and Anti-coup Protesters in Myanmar,” International Journal of Public Theology 17 (2023): 226-45.
For those who don’t know, Myanmar (formerly known as Burma) is under the rule of an oppressive military junta known as the Tatmadaw. There have been genocidal attacks on minority peoples including Rohingya and Karen peoples. In Myanmar, Christianity is the majority religion among minority ethnic groups. There have been brutal attacks on Christian villages and churches (watch this video). There is a complex history here going as far back as the Mongol empire, local dynasties that covered much of Southeast Asia, British colonialism, Japanese occupation, Chinese influence, post-independence crises and coups, etc. There is also the junta’s dismissal of the 2019 election victory of democracy activist Aung San Suu Kyi, inspired by Donald Trump’s example, to claim that the election was fraudulent.
There’s an article about the Tatmadaw deliberately bombing churches.
In this article, Moe discusses the potential theological response of churches in Myanmar to the 2021 coup, focusing on the interpretation of Romans 13:1-7. The text presents a dilemma, questioning whether it justifies blind obedience to the coup-led state or provides the basis for resistance. Moe (with Scott) proposes a reading of Rom 13:4 as a “hidden script” for a public theology that demands the church's faithful disobedience to the military junta. They suggest a correspondence between Paul's texts and contemporary protesters, revealing modes of public and covert resistance to the military junta.
Or, as the blurb puts it:
The text presents those who invoke its use with a dilemma that requires resolution and decision. Is it an oppressive text that justifies the coup and commands the church’s blind obedience to the coup-led state? Does Paul’s exhortation to be subject to the governing authorities’ (13:1) justify the line of the church’s uncritical obedience? Or does his description of the governing authorities as ‘servants for good’ (v.4) provide the basis for resistance to the coup conceived as adharma or untruth or evil? James Scott’s creative theory of hidden transcripts suggests that the text can be read as a script for a public theology that demands the church’s faithful disobedience to the coup. It invites a fresh reading of Paul being resistant to empire in a hidden and indirect way. Rom: 13.4 may then be placed in dialogue with Rom. 12:9 (‘resisting evil and loving good’). Through a hermeneutic of correspondence between Paul’s texts and contemporary protesters of the coup forms of everyday public resistance to the military power are disclosed. The text becomes a vehicle through which the goals of the resistance movement can be set in a biblical case for a public theology.
Moe writes:
The current condition of the country is one of trauma and great stress. The often invisible acts of compassion and empathy for the other enable the spirituality of resilience even in the midst of severe psychological pressure. It is a way of resistance that can generate hope and a sense of being a participant not simply in protest, in opposition and reaction. Resistance to the military coup is not a short-term movement. It is a long-term movement that involves everyday revolutionary actions of people. The practice of everyday resistance through public and hidden transcripts allows for a sense of working for a hope for something other than what is presently in place. The hidden transcript, no less than its public counterpart, can serve a public vision.
In terms of application for the Christians of Myanmar, Moe suggests: questioning the state, standing in solidarity with the victims, and resisting the unjust state in open and hidden ways.
Of course, there is a debate about Paul, the Roman empire, and hidden transcripts, so I recommend reading Christoph Heilig’s book Hidden Criticism?: The Methodology and Plausibility of the Search for a Counter-Imperial Subtext in Paul which is now open access.