PEACE

PEACE . In a negative sense religious traditions speak of peace as freedom from war and unrest. Peace can also take a positive meaning of well-being and fulfillment as goals of religious and social life. In ancient Greece the word for peace, eirēnē, meant primarily the opposite of war, and even when personified as a goddess, Eirene had no mythology and little cult. The Roman Pax was also a vague goddess, scarcely heard of before the age of Augustus and then taken as the representation of quiet at home and abroad. The Pax Romana expressed the absence of internal strife, although Seneca remarked that whole tribes and peoples had been forced to change their habitats.

In ancient Hebrew thought, peace (shālōm ) was not only the absence of war but well-being if not prosperity. A famous passage that appears twice in the Bible (Is. 2:2–4, Mi. 4:1–3) describes all nations going to Jerusalem to learn the divine law, beating their swords into plowshares and their spears into pruning hooks, abandoning their swords, and learning war no more. Micah adds that every man would sit under his vine and fig tree, an ideal picture of a small landholder in a tiny state between rival superpowers. In expectation of a better future the ideal Davidic king is called Prince of Peace, and his government is described as having boundless dominion and peace (Is. 9:6–7).

The Israelites used the Hebrew word shālōm to refer to material and spiritual conditions that were joined together. Psalm 85 envisages God speaking peace to his people, righteousness and peace united, and the land yielding its increase. It is not only war that destroys peace but also covetousness, false dealing, and priests and prophets who practice abominations and say "Peace, peace, when there is no peace" (Jer. 6:14). To the Israelites peace was a social concept; it was visible and produced a harmonious relationship in the family, in local society, and between nations. The salutation shālōm expressed the positive aim of encouraging friendly cooperation and living together for mutual benefit, and such a greeting, in use from the times of the judges and David, was later employed by both Jews and Christians.

The Arabic word salām, meaning "peace" or "health," has been in general use as a greeting or salutation since the time of the Qurʾān. One of its oldest chapters speaks of the coming down of the Qurʾān on "the Night of Power" and concludes that "it is peace until the rising of the dawn" (97:5). God calls people to the "abode of peace" (dār al-salām ), both in this life and in the next (10:26).

It is as a salutation that the Qurʾān has most to say about salām. The prophet Muḥammad said "Peace be upon you" (al-salām ʿalaykum ) at the beginning of a message, and this was reckoned to be the greeting given to the blessed when they entered Paradise. It became the common salutation in the Islamic world, and the Qurʾān recommends its use. The salām formula, thought to be used by angels, is uttered after the names of previous prophets—Noah, Abraham, Moses, Jesus, and the like.

In Islamic ritual, the prayer for the blessing of God and peace on the Prophet, the worshiper, those present, and pious servants of God precedes the confession of faith. At the end of formal prayer the worshiper turns to the right and to the left, invoking the peace and mercy of God. Liturgical use helped to make the peace formula characteristic of Islam, and it is recommended to return the greeting with an additional blessing, following the Qurʾanic verse "When you receive a greeting, respond with a better" (4:86–88).

Islamic eschatology, in popular tradition, has held to the hope of a future deliverer who would rule according to the example of the Prophet and give stability to Islam for a short millennium before the end of all earthly things: The Mahdi, "the guided one," would descend from heaven and fill the earth with equity and justice.

In the New Testament both the Gospels and the epistles use the Greek word eirēnē for "peace," although Jesus must have used the Aramaic equivalent of the Hebrew shālōm, and eirēnē is given the positive sense of the Hebrew. When the apostles were sent out they were instructed to say "Peace be to this house," on entering any house, and, "If a son of peace is there, your peace shall rest upon him; but if not, it shall return to you again" (Lk. 10:6). The peacemaker was blessed, and the struggling early church was exhorted to "follow after things which make for peace, to edify one another" (Rom. 14:19).

The reconciliation of Jews and Gentiles was sought through Christ: "He is our peace, who made both one" (Eph. 2:14). For those under external pressures, peace was a spiritual calm as well as a social benefit, as promised by Christ in his parting words, according to John, "Peace I leave with you, my peace I give you, not as the world gives it" (Jn. 14.27). This led on to Paul's view of the peace of God that passes human understanding, and the "fruits of the Spirit" included peace among virtues such as patience, kindness, and forbearance.

In New Testament eschatology there is little detail of the future, except in the Apocalypse of John (Revelation ). Instead there are general statements about the ultimate triumph of good, when "God shall be all in all." Meanwhile the kingdom of God is "righteousness and peace and joy in the Holy Spirit" (Rom. 14:17).

In the history of the church peace has been seen on the one hand as calm for the soul and on the other as social and political reconciliation and the establishment of a just order. This has led to doctrines of a just war or to judgments on social change, but more general statements speak of individual and communal well-being. Augustine of Hippo in his City of God (De civitate Dei 413–426) remarks that peace is the purpose of war between nations, for no one would seek war by peace, but as the peace of humankind is an orderly obedience to the eternal law of God, so the peace of God's city is "the perfect union of hearts, in the enjoyment of God and of one another in God" (19.13). Peace is our final good; eternity in peace, or peace in eternity, for the good of peace is the greatest wish of the world and the most welcome when it comes.

The salutation Peace is frequent in the New Testament, and it entered into the liturgy. In the traditional canon of the Latin Mass the priest said or chanted both "Dominus vobiscum" ("The Lord be with you") and "Pax Domini sit semper vobiscum" ("The Peace of the Lord be always with you"). In modern times there has been a revival of "the peace," or "giving the peace," in many churches. For example, the peace may be given throughout the congregation with the words "the peace of the Lord," and this is often accompanied by the shaking of hands or even kissing in peace.

Both social and personal ideals of peace have been important concerns of Chinese religious leaders and thinkers. The Daoist classic Dao de jing comments that one who seeks to help a ruler by the Dao will oppose all conquest by force of arms. Not only will the Daoist be against war and weapons, but will object to imposed rules and government, even to morality and wisdom, because the Daoist believes that in simplicity and fewness of desires evil would disappear.

The Daoist should adopt a peaceful or passive attitude, "actionless activity" (wuwei), and by such wordless teaching will control all creatures, and everything will be duly regulated. Colin A. Ronan (1978) has noted that Joseph Needham rejected the customary translation of wuwei as "inaction" (p. 98). The Daoist, he maintained, is not idle or passive, but is natural. He or she should refrain from acting against the grain, from trying to make things perform unsuitable functions, from exerting force when a perceptive person would see that force must fail. There is support for this view in The Book of Huainan (120 bce), which criticizes those who claim that the person who acts with wuwei does not speak or move or will not be driven by force. No sages, it says, gave such an interpretation, but the proper view of such quiet activity is that no personal prejudice should check the Dao, and no desires lead the proper courses of techniques astray. Nonaction does not mean doing nothing; it means allowing everything to act according to its nature.

In popular Daoism the ideals of a past golden age of peace, and of one yet to come, were expressed in the Taiping Dao, the Way of great peace, which arose about 175 ce. Some of its doctrines had been stated in a lost scripture decades earlier, the Taiping jing (Classic of great peace). Its writer, Yu Ji, was a preacher and healer in Shantung province who was executed about 197, although his followers believed that he had become an immortal.

The new movement, the Way of Great Peace, was established by Zhang Jue, who founded in 175 ce an organization of which he was the "Heavenly General." He held vast public ceremonies at which the sick confessed their sins and were healed by faith. What is just as important, Zhang Jue sent missionaries to convert people in central and eastern China to the way of peace and healing. Crowds flocked to this movement, probably because the troubled times of warfare gave rise to the longing for a millenarian era reminiscent of the mythical golden age of peace. There was also dissatisfaction with the coldness of state Confucianism, and a yearning for a more personal religion and a more just society.

The Way of Great Peace became very popular, and eight provinces were converted by its missionaries. The central government was alarmed and prepared countermeasures. The Daoists were warned, and on the day that the governmental action began they decided to revolt. The rebels wore yellow kerchiefs on their heads, thus giving rise to the movement's other name, Yellow Turbans. Zhang Jue and his brothers were caught and executed, but it was many years before the rebellion was finally suppressed.

In the nineteenth century the Taiping Rebellion swept across China and almost destroyed the crumbling Manzhu dynasty. It raged from 1850 to 1865 and was put down only with the help of foreign powers, notably the British, and with a catastrophic loss of some twenty million lives. The leader of the rebellion, Hong Xiuquan, sought to establish the Taiping, the Great Peace, under a purely Chinese dynasty, but he was inspired by both Chinese and Christian ideas. The Taiping would come in the cycle of history but would resemble the kingdom of heaven, where all people would worship the heavenly father.

Hong proclaimed his regime the Heavenly Kingdom of Great Peace and himself took the title Heavenly King. Nanjing was captured in 1853 and renamed Heavenly Capital, but internal divisions and external attacks led to its collapse. By 1864 Hong had despaired of his cause; he took poison and died, and his followers were overwhelmed. Later Chinese attempts at reform and peace through strength occurred, but not all were inspired by Daoist ideals.

Indian views of peace are both personal and social, positive and negative. Many sacred Hindu texts open with the sacred syllable oṃ, followed for invocation and meditation by a threefold repetition of the Sanskrit word for peace: śāntiḥ, śāntiḥ, śāntiḥ. (These three words appear at the end of T. S. Eliot's famous poem The Waste Land, 1922.) The peace invoked in the Sanskrit texts is one of tranquillity, quiet, calmness of mind, absence of passion, aversion of pain, and indifference to the objects of pleasure and pain.

In the Bhagavadgītā the despondency of the warrior Arjuna, with which the poem opens, comes from envisaging the destruction of human beings and order (dharma ) that war would bring. Arjuna is moved by compassion, declares that he would rather be killed than kill other beings, and lays down his weapons. His charioteer, the god Kṛṣṇa, gives several answers to Arjuna's problems, the chief one of which is that a soldier may kill the body but cannot kill the soul, or self, which is indestructible and immortal, without beginning or end. This answer ignores the question of Arjuna's compassion. The true yogin, whether he be a warrior or not, should be detached; he should act but remain unmoved by the result of his actions. Thus he can "attain the peace that culminates in nirvāṇa and rests in me [i.e., God]" (6.15). Kindness to all beings is occasionally suggested in the Gītā, but the general picture is one of peace and tranquillity unmoved by the affairs of the world.

The Jains in India have been noted for their advocacy of nonviolence, or not killing (ahiṃsā ), and some of their temples today bear the inscription (in English as well as in Sanskrit), "Nonviolence is the highest religion." They teach that nirvāṇa is an indescribable and passionless state beyond this world, at the ceiling of the universe. The Buddhists, contemporary with the Jains, have also taught nirvāṇa and have done so in negative terms. A Buddhist compendium of teachings, The Questions of King Milinda, agrees that nirvāṇa cannot be indicated in form or shape, in duration or size, by simile or argument. Yet it does exist: "There is nirvāṇa "; it is lofty and exalted, inaccessible to the passions and unshakable, bringing joy and shedding light.

Positive social efforts for peace were illustrated in the words and actions of the most famous Indian ruler, the Buddhist emperor Aśoka, in the third century bce, as revealed by extant inscriptions on pillars and rocks. After thousands of people had been killed in his war against the Kalingas, Aśoka felt remorse, renounced war, sought reconciliation, and wished that "all beings should be unharmed, self-controlled, calm in mind, and gentle." Fighting was forbidden, as was all killing of animals for food or sacrifice. Medical services were provided for human beings and animals, useful herbs were planted, wells were dug, and trees were planted along roads to shelter people and animals. Local rulers were instructed to tour among their people and teach the dharma of obedience to parents, generosity to priests, prohibition of killing, ownership of "the minimum of property."

In modern times Mohandas Gandhi (1869–1948) was noted for teaching ahiṃsā, but not just as a negative way to peace and justice. He coined the term satyāgraha (literally, "truth insistence"), defining it as "soul force" or "the force which is born of truth and love or nonviolence." Gandhi sought to follow the New Testament injunction to return good for evil as well as to follow the Jain command of nonviolence. He argued that soul force was the only method by which home rule could be regained for India and that it was "superior to the force of arms." Further, in a message to Hindus and Muslims on communal unity Gandhi insisted that politics should be approached in a religious spirit. He ended his speech with these words: "I ask all lovers of communal peace to pray that the God of truth and love may give us both the right spirit and the right word, and use us for the good of the dumb millions."

See Also

Ahiṃsā; Nonviolence; Taiping; War and Warriors, overview article.

Bibliography

Biblical teaching about peace can be found in many books, and useful articles are included in A Dictionary of Christian Spirituality (London, 1983) and A Dictionary of Christian Ethics (Philadelphia, 1967). Islamic texts are listed in the Shorter Encyclopaedia of Islam (1953; reprint, Leiden, 1974). Indian and Chinese teachings with selections from texts are easily found in Sources of Indian Tradition and Sources of Chinese Tradition (New York, 1958 and 1960), edited by Wm. Theodore de Bary and others. Daoist movements are described by Holmes Welch in The Parting of the Way: Lao Zu and the Daoist Movement (London, 1957), and informative chapters on Daoism, Confucianism, and Buddhism are included in Colin A. Ronan's Shorter Science and Civilisation in China (New York, 1978), an abridgment of Joseph Needham's text from volumes 1 and 2 of the larger work.

Geoffrey Parrinder (1987)