Indiana Gov. Mike Pence, who is totally not running for President, decided to quote the Bible while giving a speech on foreign policy. He said, “The Old Book says, ‘If the trumpet does not sound a clear call, who will know to get ready for battle?’” This is from 1 Corinthians 14:8.
But there are other Bible verses that give more specific advice on foreign policy that Gov. Pence could have quoted. It would have been pretty badass if he had gone with Deuteronomy.
Deuteronomy 7:1-2 and 20:10-17:
When the Lord your God brings you into the land you are entering to possess and drives out before you many nations . . . and when the Lord your God has delivered them over to you and you have defeated them, then you must destroy them totally. Make no treaty with them, and show them no mercy.
. . .
When you march up to attack a city, make its people an offer of peace. If they accept and open their gates, all the people in it shall be subject to forced labor and shall work for you. If they refuse to make peace and they engage you in battle, lay siege to that city. When the Lord your God delivers it into your hand, put to the sword all the men in it. As for the women, the children, the livestock and everything else in the city, you may take these as plunder for yourselves. And you may use the plunder the Lord your God gives you from your enemies. This is how you are to treat all the cities that are at a distance from you and do not belong to the nations nearby.However, in the cities of the nations the Lord your God is giving you as an inheritance, do not leave alive anything that breathes. Completely destroy[a] them . . . as the Lord your God has commanded you.
No surprise here. He doesn’t know any more about the different testaments than he knows about the Constitution. But, that obviously makes no difference to his supporters.
So “Old Book” = “Old Testament”? I think it was just a way of avoiding both “Good book” and “Bible,” and I’ll give him a C-minus in Neologisms 101.
Apparently, Mr. Pence didn’t have the courage to call it “the bible” instead of “the Old Book” (sic). More appropriate for this time, and considering the great damage inflicted on thousands of soldiers who have returned, he might have offered this comment from Jesus:
” Or what king, going out to confront another king in battle, will not sit down first and determine whether he is able with ten thousand to oppose the one coming against him with twenty thousand? If he cannot succeed, he will send a representative while the other is still a long way off and ask for terms of peace.” (Luke 14:31-32, NLT).
War costs more than money, and foreign policy is more than bluster, but those insights have not yet penetrated Mr. Pence’s imagination.
Come think of it, considering Mr. Pence’s insensitivity toward the suffering of people with his historical intransigent attitude toward Medicaid expansion, he might have considered this from Micah (6:8, NLT):
“No, O people, the Lord has told you what is good,
and this is what he requires of you:
to do what is right, to love mercy,
and to walk humbly with your God.”
Can’t seem to find anything good about being a self-righteous, judgmental and arrogant prig. He must be reading from a different bible than I have.
Dude! Do da Deuteronomy!
“Reach in them jeans and pull out them greens!”– Reverend Deuteronomy Skaggs.