The Problem of Sovereignty: Part 2

Divine Right Theory

In my previous essay on sovereignty, we saw that in order to form a State the way we commonly understand it, someone who previously did not have sovereignty must assert it, which necessitates acts of aggression. These acts would seem to be unjustified. Is there anything that can justify them?

In that essay we already dispensed with the spurious notion of social contract theory. All variations of the social contract theory run into the problem that “nobody can give what he does not have”.

The other theory sometimes put forward is Divine Right. On its face divine right theory would seem to solve the problem of no person or group having an a priori right to rule over others. God is sovereign, so He can delegate sovereignty if He wants. Any kind of monotheist necessarily believes this.

In this essay we’ll examine whether divine right sovereignty actually exists. Because I am Catholic, I focus heavily on Church teaching and on the logic of the question itself. I think Protestants will still find it interesting, as I address scriptural arguments as well, but for Prots I would also recommend Nick Watt’s book Taxation is Slavery. He is a Protestant and makes scriptural arguments from that angle.

With that said, we’ll first look at the logical implication of divine right, and then the arguments from authority, both tradition and scripture.

Divine Right Theory

If sovereignty is not achieved through consent, it must be achieved by force. That is, states form when one group, internal or external to a society, conquers the rest. Since, on its face, such aggression violates the 5th and 7th commandments, we would need to establish that God has given some person or group a people an exemption or special privilege which enables them to legitimately initiate force against others in order to bring them under their control.

But where does this right come from? No one is born with such rights. Hereditary monarchies have to start somewhere. In order for hereditary monarchs to be legitimate, their predecessor must be, since no one can give what he doesn’t have. So even in a hereditary monarchy this question applies to the founder of the dynasty.

While Pope Leo XIII attempts to establish justifications for State power in Diuturnum Illud, he acknowledges “No man has in himself... the power of constraining the free will of others... This power resides solely in God.”

Divine Right theorists will rely primarily on proof texts from scripture to show the legitimacy of sovereigns, as well as a claim that states are a perennial part of the human experience and therefore need no justification.

We’ll delve into the issues with the specific texts and the historical problem later on, but for now let’s just look at the principle. The idea that scripture creates sovereignty runs into two problems: a problem with moral contradiction and a problem with precision.

The Moral Problem of Divine Right Theory

The key moral question is, if in practice sovereignty is gained through force, as we’ve seen, by what right does the conqueror act? Absent a divine decree to a particular individual, how does a would-be sovereign, or critically, his intended subjects, know that he is morally justified in initiating this seizure of power, and that they are therefore not permitted to resist? Without such a clear divine decree, there is nothing to separate him from any other brigand, nor any reason why his intended victims should not resist him as such. A generic definition of sovereign political authority is therefore empty of meaning if it doesn’t attach to specific persons.

Why can’t I claim to be king, having received this right directly from God? If I lead a powerful enough war band, who is to tell me I’m wrong? Unless this theory devolves back into “might makes right,” (which we already showed doesn’t create a duty to obey), then we need a specific, clear and public divine commission to a specific individual in order for this notion of sovereignty to have any meaning. Without it we’re just back to anarchy.

The only record we have of any such Divine decree to an individual is God making Saul King of Israel in the First book of Kings, which He does only upon the demand of the Israelites, and accompanies with a scathing rebuke. But this delegation of divine right applied only to the Israelites and so doesn’t explain the phenomenon of sovereignty writ large.

Some might advance that the very fact that conquest and state formation occurs demonstrates that it is part of God’s will. But this facile argument would justify any transgression by a stronger party, and therefore fail to create any obligation on the part of the intended subject. The fact that God permits evils like conquest does not mean He commands submission to it. God permits rape, but we are not therefore morally obliged to submit to it, and critically, we do not ever lose our moral right to self-defense against unjust attacks.

We have to distinguish between God’s active will and His passive will. God permits evil, and brings good out of it, but He never actively wills evil. If state formation requires conquest, which necessarily involves sins against the 5th and 7th commandments, it is not possible to say that God actively wills it, or that it is part of man’s nature properly speaking. (Of course, when discussing the moral law, we refer to man’s nature before the Fall, not his fallen inclinations.) Consequently, the fact that states do form is not a justification of them doing so, and would not obligate us to submit to them.

In order to prove divine right theory, we would need to show that God gives special power to particular individuals over particular subjects and territory. This leads us to the second issue with Divine Right theory.

The Precision Problem of Divine Right Theory

While we may not be able to trace a divine mandate back to any ruler but Saul, we can point to a myriad of Bible verses mentioning rulers and their power in the abstract. Pope Leo XIII rolls out a catalogue of such verses in Diuturnum Illud.

But the notion of sovereignty as an abstract concept is problematic because of its imprecision. Who holds it? Over what territory? And over what particular individuals and families? And how is this established? These are critical questions to establish a coherent theory of divine right that is morally binding.

Of course, in concrete historical terms, the answer to each of these is determined by the outcome of military engagements. But unless we accept battle as being a manifestation of God’s active positive will, then this reality leaves us no further along. And, as we’ll see later, even taking this “trial by combat” or “might makes right” approach doesn’t establish the modern “Catholic” notion of sovereignty either.

Reading modern Catholic political thinkers, one gets the impression that sovereignty is a sort of abstract thing floating over an indefinite body of subjects, which can be captured and wielded by whomever.

But abstractions do not possess rights. Rights belong only to moral agents, i.e. individual persons. Even families and communities are not moral agents in the strict sense. They are descriptions of relationships between moral agents. Families and communities don’t merit, commit sin, or go to heaven or hell, only individuals do. Since only individuals are moral agents, Only individuals can have rights, properly speaking, which would include the supposed “right to rule.”

(Communities can be considered “moral persons” by analogy when they act as a unified order toward a common good. In such cases, the rights they ‘possess’ are not inherent or original, but derivative, arising from the consent and coordination of individuals and from the natural order of common goods that require shared action. We’ll delve into this more when we examine what types of non-sovereign political authority do actually exist.)

When God grants authority, He does so with clarity. Christ appointed twelve Apostles, laid hands on them, and they on their successors. The papacy has a clear line of succession. No such clarity exists for temporal rulers.

This ambiguity causes serious contradictions. The Church condemned the French Revolution and the regime it spawned, and again condemned its successor regime the Third Republic in 1872 but later reversed its position and acknowledged the Third Republic in 1892. At what point did it become legitimate? And how? In recognizing it, Leo XIII said, “The consent of the people may designate the ruler...” But if so, how could we condemn the revolutions that expressed that very will of the people to designate a new ruler?

If the “established order” is legitimized by the very fact of being established, we have a logical problem of self-reference. The idea is circular. And in practice it just amounts to the obvious prudential counsel that you must remain subject as long as the power dynamic is against you. If on the other hand, you and your faction can seize power, you are legitimized by your very success.

The implication is troubling: God has created an implicit right, (which we are asked to believe overrides explicit rights like self-defense and property) as a floating abstraction, which in practice is claimable by whomever can seize it.

This brings us right back to might makes right, which, as we already established, doesn’t establish a moral obligation to obey.

Two Swords Theory

The least flimsy of all the claims to divine right is the claim by the papacy to temporal power. The pope, unlike temporal rulers, has a direct chain of succession back to Christ with a specific grant of power. Christ said to Peter “And I will give to thee the keys of the kingdom of heaven. And whatsoever thou shalt bind upon earth, it shall be bound also in heaven: and whatsoever thou shalt loose on earth, it shall be loosed also in heaven.” (Matt 16:19)

During the Last Supper, Christ had said to His disciples: “But now he that hath a purse, let him take it, and likewise a scrip; and he that hath not, let him sell his coat, and buy a sword. For I say to you, that this that is written must yet be fulfilled in me: And with the wicked was he reckoned. For the things concerning me have an end. But they said: Lord, behold here are two swords. And he said to them: It is enough.” (Luke 22:38)

From the 9th century until the 20th century these verses were used to argue for the pope’s temporal power, claiming that the “two swords” in question represent the spiritual and temporal power. The strongest interpretation of this “two swords theory” holds that the pope, as the Vicar of Christ, holds all spiritual power on earth, as well as all temporal power, and that he delegates his temporal power to secular rulers.

While this theory avoids the precision problem pointed out above, it runs into other problems.

The first is that Christ expressly denies setting up a temporal kingdom (“My kingdom is not of this world”) and we are told this is the main reason the Pharisees rejected Him, that he rebuked their desire for a temporal kingdom.

He also says “You know that the princes of the Gentiles lord it over them... it shall not be so among you: but whosoever will be chief among you, let him be your servant.”

This would seem to contradict the notion that he was setting up a temporal sovereignty licensed to commit coercion like taxation and conscription, which would be necessary if we were to impute a temporal sovereignty to Peter which he could delegate to kings.

Perhaps an even bigger problem for the theory is the historical record.

De facto papal temporal power dates back to the 9th century when Pepin the Short gifted the papal states to the Pope in 754. This implies that they were his to give in the first place.

Even more tellingly, the papacy justified its claim to temporal power over the whole Western Empire to the gift of Constantine. This is problematic not only because the document was a forgery, but more importantly, because it implies that the Papacy received authority from Constantine, not the other way around. This would contradict the core claim of two swords theory.

Constantine, of course, would be subject to the same questions we posed about other secular rulers above.

The Church effectively abandoned this position vis-a-vis the temporal power after the loss of the papal states and the Lateran Treaty of 1929.

In summary, while this explanation of sovereignty passes the precision test, it is unconvincing on both theological and historical grounds.

Arguments from Authority

In purely rational terms, the argument from authority is a fallacy and does not have any logical force. As St. Thomas is reputed to have said: “It doesn’t matter who said a thing, but the content of what he said.” An argument must be able to stand on its own merits. The authority of the proponent only adds weight to it, it cannot make a bad argument good.

This is specifically relevant in the context of church teaching on social order. At this point, many are likely thinking: “This is all fine and good, but what about all the Bible verses and Papal documents that seem to clearly teach the legitimacy of the state and obedience to its authority?”

Initially I was going to dive into all of the historical evidence that the Church’s political teachings cannot be considered authoritative, but this essay is already getting long, and that’s a more niche subject that deserves a separate essay. So I will focus on the Scriptural arguments and statements of theologians, since the papal arguments largely hinge on those.

As a very brief treatment of the papal position on political matters we can say the following:

Since the Peace of Westphalia the Vatican has taken a damage control/ conciliatory position with regard to politics. Their goal appears to have been not to rock the boat with taking sides in political conflict and largely defaulting to the position of “don’t challenge the established authority” in order to avoid crackdowns by the state that could hamper the ministry. This is all fine and good as a prudential decision, but they also continued to make those statements in strong moral language, giving credence to the additional powers usurped by the state, which would never have been accepted in the middle ages.

For anyone who still thinks Vatican pronouncements on political matters are authoritative, here’s a quick list of major things they’ve gotten wrong:

1. Slavery - See John Maxwell Slavery and the Catholic Church. You’ve been told “The Church was always against slavery!” This is simply not true. This is a major moral/ political issue the Church completely changed its teaching on

2. The French Revolution - They condemned it, but then failed to support the Vendeeans, and then later required French Catholics to submit to the Republic. Either the revolution is legitimate or it isn’t, you can’t have it both ways.

3. The Cristeros - The Vatican and the Mexican bishops officially opposed armed resistance despite the fact that there maybe has never been a more clear causus belli. Their influence is what caused the Cristeros to lay down their arms, which resulted in their massacre by the Communist government. The Church ;later recognized the rebellion as legitimate.

4. The Anglo-Irish War - The Vatican and Irish bishops officially opposed armed resistance to British occupation despite the fact that this was a textbook just war by Scholastic standards. The bishop of Cork even issued excommunications for anyone fighting the British. The IRA wisely ignored him, and the Vatican immediately changed sides and recognized the Irish Republic as soon as they won.

That is only a small list, but you get the point. The Vatican may claim to be protected from error if it claims something is about “morals” but this evidently isn’t the case for anything political.

So much for the papacy. Let’s take a look at the infamous Scripture verses.

Scripture

We won’t go into every single scripture verse that mentions government or civil authority, but focus on the most commonly used, as the arguments will apply across the board.

Romans 13

The most commonly cited defense of the state, as it is the most explicit and forceful is Romans 13.

St. Paul writes: “Let every soul be subject to higher powers: for there is no power but from God: and those that are, are ordained of God.
Therefore he that resisteth the power, resisteth the ordinance of God. And they that resist, purchase to themselves damnation.

For princes are not a terror to the good work, but to the evil. Wilt thou then not be afraid of the power? Do that which is good: and thou shalt have praise from the same.
For he is God’s minister to thee, for good. But if thou do that which is evil, fear: for he beareth not the sword in vain. For he is God’s minister: an avenger to execute wrath upon him that doth evil.
Wherefore be subject of necessity, not only for wrath, but also for conscience’ sake.
For therefore also you pay tribute. For they are the ministers of God, serving unto this purpose.
Render therefore to all men their dues. Tribute, to whom tribute is due: custom, to whom custom: fear, to whom fear: honor, to whom honor.”

At face value this sounds pretty damning. However, like many other verses in Scripture if we take only the literal, surface interpretation we are obliged to accept a quagmire of contradictions.

St. Paul writes “princes are not a terror to the good work, but to the evil.” But he wrote this under Nero, who murdered Christians for sport and was at that very moment actively persecuting Paul and the other apostles and disciples for preaching the Gospel. So in the very case in question, the prince was quite literally a terror to good works. And the persecution was the “ordinance of God” only in the sense of His passive will, since it violated Divine law. So it is quite impossible to take it literally, just on its face. More plausibly, Paul is pointing out that , particularly in the context he was writing in, subjection and martyrdom were more advantageous than resistance.

This is very much in the same vein as his exhortations that slaves obey their masters. We don’t take this as a moral justification of the institution of slavery, nor as a denial of an enslaved person’s right to self-defense.

But for those stubborn literalists, let’s take a moment to examine exactly what it would mean if we did take Romans 13 literally. If St. Paul is saying that God positively willed the sovereignty of Nero, then he would be saying God positively willed the grave sins which created the imperial sovereignty to begin with. These sins were not contingent accidents of the empire, they were central to its power. Nero’s predecessors came to power of course through aggressive violence, treachery and murder, in a brutal civil war that killed hundreds of thousands and left Roman society in tatters. This war was quickly followed by the brutal liquidation of Octavian’s political enemies. Were these grave sins positively willed by God?

The principate itself was formed out of Caesar’s coup against the previously “established authority” in the Senate. So if the Roman Empire is justified, then it is justifiable to overthrow governments if you can pull it off? So this argument runs up against the same logical issues we encountered earlier.

To reiterate, statists claiming that a regime has legitimate moral authority must explain how that authority actually passed from God to the regime. They must be able to show that its formation was God’ s active, not passive will. In the case of the first century Caesar’s, as with every other, the Regime fails that test.

If we take this verse literally, as a blanket grant of legitimacy to any sovereign, we run afoul of the logical contradictions mentioned before, but also of history. If the sovereign is necessarily “God’s minister” in a literal positive sense, rather than a permissive one, we must condemn any resistance. This contradicts the Church’s long teaching on the right of resistance. It would also condemn the Cristeros, the Vendeans, and every other Catholic uprising against tyranny.

It would be similar to if we interpreted Christ’s injunction to “resist not evil” and “turn the other cheek” as meaning that we have no right to self-defense and are morally obligated to submit ourselves to any aggression. But the opposite is true. Men in particular have a positive obligation to defend their families and communities against aggression. And of course scripture is full of examples of this, most notably the Maccabees.

More plausibly, Romans 13 is a prudential exhortation in a historically contingent context. St. Paul was writing a letter to the Romans which was certain to be read by the authorities, as they were seizing all of his correspondence. There was nothing to be gained by giving the Roman authorities any more pretext to claim that the Christians were rebellious. The Apostles’ mission was not political.

To take this verse as establishing the legitimacy of the Roman state, much less states in general, would lead to a contradiction.

Render unto Caesar

The next Scripture passage commonly used to argue for State legitimacy is the verse “render unto Caesar” from Matthew 22:-15-21

Then the Pharisees going, consulted among themselves how to ensnare him in his speech.

16. And they sent to him their disciples with the Herodians, saying: Master, we know that thou art a true speaker, and teachest the way of God in truth, neither carest thou for any man: for thou dost not regard the person of men.

17. Tell us therefore what dost thou think, is it lawful to give tribute to Caesar, or not?

18. But Jesus knowing their wickedness, said: Why do you tempt me, ye hypocrites?

19. Shew me the coin of the tribute. And they offered him a penny.

20. And Jesus saith to them: Whose image and inscription is this?

21. They say to him: Caesar’s. Then he saith to them: Render therefore to Caesar the things that are Caesar’s; and to God, the things that are God’s.

This one is a much weaker supporting text for sovereignty given the wording. Many seem to take this as a justification of state power and taxation. But consider the wording of the question. Is it lawful to give tribute to Caesar?”

If Christ were actually giving a full-throated approval, we would expect something like “Not only is it lawful, it’s good and obligatory”

But He doesn’t say that. Instead, He rebukes them and gives them a non-answer. Christ does not specify what is Caesar’s or attempt to litigate Roman control of Judea. He redirects the conversation back to the core message of worshipping God.

But if we take this as a literal justification of Roman control of Judea and a moral obligation to pay tribute, we run into the same issues as before. Rome came into possession of Judea, first indirectly when Pompey attacked Jerusalem, desecrated the Holy of Holies and set up a puppet king. The Romans later annexed Judea and made it a province. If Christ’s answer here is meant to indicate the legitimacy of all this, we have not only a moral contradiction, but a historical one. Why was it licit and even praiseworthy for the Jews to have resisted foreign conquerors in the past, including assassinating their leaders, but with the Romans resistance is not justified? Some might say this is because the dominion of Rome was a punishment. But every Jewish domination by a foreign power, whether Egypt, Assyrian, Babylon or the Seleucids was seen as a punishment by God, and in each case they were justified first in attempting to defend themselves, and later in throwing off this rule.

So it is quite impossible to take Christ’s response here as proving the legitimacy of Roman rule.

Another important detail is that Christ asks whose inscription is on the coin. If the fact that Caesar’s inscription is on the coin shows that it is his, then all currency in the Empire belongs to him. Since currency is what represents material possessions, this would imply that the sovereign owns all the property in his realm. This would contradict the Catholic and natural law notion of property, and also run into the logical contradiction we saw in the property section.

But if we read this passage in context, the meaning becomes quite clear. The Pharisees want a political Messiah, who will give them a great temporal victory over their enemies. Meanwhile, they have corrupted God’s law and their hearts are given to the things of this world. Christs’ message isa rebuke to their legalism and focus on the temporal, and a call to the supernatural.

“Render unto Caesar” is another instance of the frequent Gospel story of Christ admonishing the Jews not to confuse their temporal desires and political activism with religious fidelity and virtue.

1 Kings

Every so often someone will make the mistake of citing Kings to show that God established temporal kingship. This si typical because they forgot what thai passage actually says, which is a damning indictment of the Israelites request for a king and a laundry list of evils the king will visit on them, all of which should sound very familiar to us. It deserves to be quoted in full:

10 And the Lord said to Samuel: Hearken to the voice of the people in all that they say to thee. For they have not rejected thee, but me, that I should not reign over them.

11 According to all their works, they have done from the day that I brought them out of Egypt even to this day: as they have forsaken me, and served strange gods, so do they also unto thee.

12 Now therefore hearken to their voice: but yet testify to them, and foretell to them the right of the king that shall reign over them.

13 And Samuel told all the words of the Lord to the people that had desired a king of him,

14 And said: This will be the right of the king that shall reign over you:

He will take your sons, and put them in his chariots, and will make them his horsemen, and his running footmen to run before his chariots,

15 And he will appoint of them to be his tribunes, and centurions, and to plough his fields, and to reap his corn, and to make him arms and chariots.

16 Your daughters also he will take to make him ointments, and to be his cooks, and bakers.

17 And he will take your fields, and your vineyards, and your best oliveyards, and give them to his servants.

18 Moreover he will take the tenth of your corn, and of the revenues of your vineyards, to give to his eunuchs and servants.

19 Your servants also, and your handmaids, and your goodliest young men, and your asses he will take away, and put them to his work.

20 Your flocks also he will tithe, and you shall be his servants.

21 And you shall cry out in that day from the face of the king, whom you have chosen to yourselves: and the Lord will not hear you in that day.

22 But the people would not hear the voice of Samuel, and they said: Nay: but there shall be a king over us. (1 Kings 8:10–18)

And for a little icing on the Scriptural rebuttal cake we have God’s rebuke to the kings of Israel is Hosea:

“They have reigned, but not by me: they have been princes, and I knew not: of their silver, and their gold they have made idols to themselves, that they might perish.” (Hosea 8:4)

So much for the scriptural argument.

Theologians and History

I am not at all alone in critiquing Divine Right. Every major Catholic theologian rejects it as well. There is no coherent way to assert that any particular bloodline has a “right to rule” which they receive from God. Here are a couple excerpts from prominent theologians.

Aquinas in De Regno 1.6: “The multitude is the source of authority for rulers, who are constituted for the sake of the common good.”

Francisco Suárez (De Legibus, III.3): “Political power is immediately in the community, and mediately in the prince.”

Robert Bellarmine: “Political power is by the law of nature in the people.” (cf. De Laicis, ch. 6; De Romano Pontifice, Book 1, ch. 6)

Now, you may be thinking: “Wait a minute, these sound like social contract theory, I thought you said that was bunk!”

The short answer to that is that they did not believe in the modern notion of sovereignty at all, since it didn’t exist at the time. They were pointing out that social authority, such as it is, is always derivative from consent. But social authority was structurally different before modernity.

The long answer is a deep dive into the political philosophy of the middle ages and its polycentric civil order which is beyond the scope of an essay, but which I will summarize in Part 3, which will be about the historicity of the state.