Just War, Penance, and the Church

Abstract

Aristotle reported that some peoples rewarded their warriors returning from battle in proportion to how many they killed and punished those who had not killed enough (Politics VII.1324blO-22). Christians have not followed the example of such peoples. In the place of rewards Christians have often demanded penance for those returning from battle. Exactly why penance was thought necessary in some cases is not perfectly clear, but it is clear that penance was demanded at least from those who fought unjustly and sometimes even from those who fought justly. So, from the very beginning of Christian involvement in warfare, ecclesiastical authorities demanded that at least some, if not always all, Christian soldiers should do penance. The Christian just war doctrine has always played a large role in shaping Christian moral approaches to war. When the church did not demand penance from all soldiers, the just war doctrine is what allowed it to judge exactly who needed penance. For the just war doctrine is the tool that allows the church to distinguish justice from injustice in war, and thus to distinguish soldiers deserving of praise and those deserving of shame and penance. PENANCE FOR SOLDIERING: WHO AND WHY Roman, Anglo-Saxon, Irish, and French penitentials up until the eleventh century all prescribed penances for soldiers who killed in battle.