Romans 13:1-7 Apartheid's Last Biblical Refuge

Abstract

That the interpretation of Romans 13:1-7 has been integral to much theological discussion in South Africa for over a decade is no accident. Having abandoned its previous biblical bases for support of apartheid ideology, the white Dutch Reformed church, in common with the state, and certain fundamentalist missionary groups, often connected with the American religious right, have pointed to this passage and its parallels as the ultimate sanction for enforced submission to present power relations. Liberationist and black theologians who signed The Kairos Document of 1985-86 castigate such use of the passage as an aspect of idolatrous "state theology." Their approach is to relativize its applicability by reference to situational and total biblical context. In contributing to the debate, Walter Wink argues that the passage forbids only violent, not non-violent opposition to the state. This view is criticized, and yet another approach proposed, based on the hypothesis that Romans 13:1-7 is part of an overall redaction of the Pauline letters connected with the Pastoral Epistles. A hermeneutical method similar to that of black theologian, Itumeleng J. Mosala is applied to the passage to identify a "kindred struggle" among Christians of Asia Minor in the earlier second century.