Pacificism, Self-Defense, and Protecting Others
I. Luke 22:35-38
In Luke’s gospel Jesus gave his disciples one final piece of advice before they left the upper room for Gethsemane:
35“When I sent you out with no money bag, knapsack, or shoes, you didn’t lack anything, did you? “No.” 36“But now, if you have a money bag, take it—and a knapsack too. If you don’t have a sword, sell your coat and buy one. 37I have to fulfill what this scripture says about me: ‘They treated me like a criminal’ [Is 53:12]. What refers to me will happen.” 38“Lord, here are two swords.” “That’s enough.”
In the future, extending the kingdom of God will be different from what these men had experienced in the Mission of the Twelve (Luke 9:1-3 = Matthew 10:1-15 = Mark 6:7-13) and the Mission of the Seventy (Luke 10:1-20 =? Matthew 10:16-23). Now they had better take a sword along (Luke 22:36). Doing so was important enough that anyone without a sword should sell his coat and buy one—even though at this time of year, it was fairly cold at night in Judaea (John 18:18, 25). Having a sword would give them something to defend themselves with. A sword was more than a tobacco stick: it represented the whole gamut of personal defense, civil resistance to evil, and national protection (Roman 13:4).
Most importantly, in this directive Jesus was talking about the same endeavor his disciples had been taking part in before: preparing for, establishing, and extending the kingdom of God. They also constituted continuity in personnel. That continuity of purpose and personnel means we can look at his later commands and the disciples’ future efforts to see what buying a sword could and would not mean.
The disciples’ remark about having two swords seems a little off the mark. We can sympathize with them, because they could entertain any number of scenarios since they did not have the advantage of subsequent experience. They were evidently wrong in their earlier assumptions (Matthew 16:21-23), but what alternatives remained were a mystery to them. At any rate, Jesus let it pass with “that is enough”; having a sword among them would in fact set up a final object lesson for the group and for the mob that would arrest him.
A. Not for protecting Jesus against the arrest and trials
There would have been little opportunity to buy swords at midnight anyway. When Peter did try to use his sword to prevent the arrest later that night in Gethsemane, Jesus stopped him, “Put your sword away. Everybody that takes up a sword dies by a sword” (Matthew 26:51-53; cp. Luke 23:49-51; John 18:10-11; Mark 14:47). The next morning the Lord could convincingly tell Pilate, “My ‘kingdom’ is not an earthly kingdom. If it was, my servants would be fighting to keep me from being delivered to the Jews” (John 18:36). Besides, Jesus’ admonition about resistance looks forward to more than what would happen in the morning (Matthew 10:16-23; Mark 13:11-13; Luke 12:21-19).
B. Not particularly for protection against wild animals
No appreciable difference from earlier missions would exist in the natural surroundings where they would be operating even though the work would become more wide-ranging and of longer duration. Swords were not crucial for that purpose during the Mission of the Twelve and the Seventy, where they were forbidden. Aside from those endeavors, during Jesus’ ministry two swords had sufficed for Jesus, the twelve disciples, and several women who traveled along to help with daily needs (Luke 22:38).1 The records give no indication that they ever had to protect themselves against wild animals. The only time the New Testament mentions wild animals is with Jesus during his temptation in the unpopulated desert area in the hills west of the Dead Sea, where John the Baptist grew up (Mark 1:13; Luke 1:20). Snakes and scorpions would be the most likely problem in open country ([Mark 16:18]; Acts 28:4); but after the return of the Seventy, Jesus promised protection against being harmed by them at least in the short term (Luke 10:17; cp. Mark 16:18).
C. Not for establishing and extending the kingdom
Jesus and the Twelve had previously been carrying a couple swords along, but they did not use them for accomplishing their work; so it must have been for protecting themselves. They had already not been “bearing the sword in vain” (cp. Romans 13:4) nor bearing it to present the kingdom.
The absence of physical force holds true across the whole program for establishing and spreading the kingdom Jesus was preparing the people for: “the kingdom of heaven is at hand” (Matthew 3:2; 4:17; 10:7; Mark 1:15).
(1) Even as early as John 4:1-38, Jesus told the Samaritan woman that Messiah’s kingdom would not center in Gerizim or Jerusalem; even though salvation originates through the Jews, God is a spirit and looks for people to worship him in spirit and truth (4:23-24).
(2) Jesus explained that the kingdom would not come “with observation” (Luke 17:20); it would not be “here or there”; it would not be geographically defined. That was because “the kingdom of God is ‘interpersonal’” (Conversational Version for έντὸς ὑμῶν). Other renderings have been “among you,” “within youpl.” The unusual preposition fits with a less usual idea closer to “between/inter-” as in inter-personal. With that understanding, CV translates the whole prepositional phrase as “interpersonal.”2
(3) Matthew evidently used “kingdom of heaven” rather than “kingdom of God” as a deliberate substitute in exact parallels with other synoptic texts.3 We can take that substitute label as in clearer contrast to a kingdom in this world, hence, spiritual, transcendent, social.
(4) The disciples’ work would continue like their previous mission of the Twelve (Matthew 10:2-15 = Mark 6:7-13 = Luke 9:1-6 16-23) and the Seventy (Luke 10:1-24 =? Matthew 10:16-23). The circumstances would change, but their method of operation would not.
(5) The Great Commission specifies extending the kingdom by teaching: “Go into all the world and make disciples . . . teaching them to observe . . . .” (Matthew 28:18-20; [cp. Mark 16:15-16]). Jesus did not issue a military commission; he sent his apostles on a campaign of influence, not force. They were to do the kinds of things that it takes to make disciples.
(6) The apostles were to speak for Jesus in Jerusalem, Judaea, Samaria, and the far reaches of the earth (Acts 1:8). The Book of Acts traces that expansion from Jerusalem to Rome.
In that connection Jesus did not send “weapons of warfare” to conquer rebellious people (2 Corinthians 10:3-4). Instead, he sent the Spirit to enhance influence as the messengers’ means and manner of operation.4 The New Testament record credits the Spirit with doing that in several overlapping ways.
(a) To call to the disciples’ minds what Jesus had taught them when he worked among them (John 14:25-26; 16:12-14; 1 John 2:20, 27: to aid memory)
(b) To teach them beyond what he had covered with them (John 14:26; 16:12-13: to add information)
(c) To help them understand what they did not seem to get very well (John 2:18-22; cp. Matthew 26:61 = Mark 14:58; 27:40 = Mark 15:29; Acts 6:14: to clarify understanding)
(d) To demonstrate through beneficial miraculous gifts what would help prove the divine origin of the message Jesus commissioned them to deliver (Acts 5:32; [Mark 16:17-18; etc.]: to prove claims)
The launching of the kingdom on Pentecost came with miraculous demonstration of the rushing, mighty wind; the tongues of fire above the apostles’ heads, and hearing these unschooled commoners speak in foreign languages from all over the Roman empire.
(e) To give the messengers wisdom that their opponents could not confute (Acts 4:8; 6:10: to strengthen presenters’ abilities)
(f) To give his representatives a boldness that met the opposition to their message (Acts 4:13-23, 29-31: to embolden the witnesses)
(g) To guide the missionaries in their travels to bear work and witness sometimes with an angel of the Lord (Acts 8:26-40; 10:17ff + 11:1ff; 11:27-30; 14:26; 13:4; 16:6, 7-13-15
(h) To provide them with responses to charges they would face when put on trial (Matthew 10:19-20; Luke 12:11-12; Acts 4:8-12; 6:8-10; 13:9-12: to quicken the spokesmen’s minds)
(i) To set examples for people to follow (1 Corinthians 4:16; 11:1; Philippians 3:17; 4:9; 1 Thessalonians 1:6; 2 Thessalonians 3:9)
(7) Paul characterizes the Messianic mission as reconciliation in 2 Corinthians 5:18-19:
18“[God] has reconciled us to himself through Christ and has given us a ministry about reconciliation 19that in Christ, God was reconciling the world to himself, not holding their trespasses against them, and putting in us the message about reconciliation. 20We’re ambassadors for Christ, and God is making his appeal to the world through us. Please, for the sake of Christ, be reconciled to God.”
These notations on setting up the kingdom demonstrate the theory behind the process. Establishing and extending the kingdom illustrate a fundamental fact about causality: manner and means conform to purpose. The nature of a process becomes evident in the nature of its result. Cause and effect lie in the same category; even Genesis 1 repeatedly pictures the principle as “after their kind.” Scripture states the concept elsewhere under wording like “People don’t gather grapes from thorns or figs from thistles, do they?” (Matthew 7:16; Mark 11:13; Luke 6:44, John 3:6; James 3:11-12; cp 1 Corinthians 15:50); “What you sow you reap” (Galatians 5:7-8). No wonder the kingdom originated and spread like it did—by influence through teaching, preaching, witnessing, explaining, setting example, doing good, ministering, reasoning with their audiences (Acts 17:2; 18:4, 14; 24:25), appealing, being ambassadors. The kingdom is interpersonal, so it originated and grows by interpersonal manner and means.5
D. For self-protection
Now comes the conclusion in regard to pacifism. “But now” (ἀλλὰ νῦν) does not indicate a change of method to prevent Jesus’ arrest and trials, nor a need to protect against dangers in the wild, nor a shift in the manner and means of establishing and spreading the kingdom (John 16:5). That leaves self-protection as the reason for carrying a sword. The same purpose of mission obtained as before, “but now” came a need for a sword for protection during the work, not for doing the work. Furthermore, a sword is not a switch; it can wound, maim, and kill as necessary. Jesus’ comments leave lesser self-protections open to discretion: physically restraining, overwhelming, disabling, besides contacting authorities when possible.
The change must come in response to increased hostility. What would cause that altered circumstance? The Mission of the Twelve and the Seventy took place during “the period of consideration” as to whether Jesus was the prophet (Deuteronomy 18:12, 18), Elijah, another returning prophet (Matthew 16:14; 17:10; Mark 6:15; Luke 9:7-8), or perhaps the Messiah (Matthew 11:2-6 = Luke 7:18-23; 26:43; John 7:26-42).
But as his ministry progressed, it became evident that (a) he did not offer what the masses thought Messiah would do. That hostility eventually boiled over under the aegis of the Jewish leadership.
(b) Along the way there was growing dissatisfaction with him as Messiah, with what he claimed, and what he taught. He was from the wrong place to be Messiah (Nazareth rather than Bethlehem: John 7:41-43,52, etc.). He spoke of this death (John 3:4; 2:8, etc.) and refused to abide by the tradition of the elders on sabbath observances (Matthew 12:14-, etc.), ceremonial defilement (Matthew 15:1-20, etc.), regularized fasting (Matthew 9:14-17, etc.); apartheid with Samaritans, Gentiles, and common people (Matthew 9:10-13, etc.); and several other points.
(c) He said things the general public as well as the religious leaders took exception to: forgiving sin (Matthew 9:1-8), speaking against the temple (Matthew 26:60-61, etc.), supposedly going beyond the Law in his injunctions (Matthew 5:17ff; cp. Acts 6:11), and the like.
(d) Some claims did not make sense to them: eating his flesh and drinking his blood (John 6:51-59), claiming to have come down from heaven when they knew is parents (John 6:38, 58), promising that his followers would never die (John 8:51-53), claiming to have seen Abraham (John 8:56-59), and other matters.6
(e) With the death of the leader, opponents would be emboldened against his disciples with more than earlier verbal challenges. Killing Jesus removed a major reason for accepting him as Messiah; only by convincing the masses that Jesus had resurrected could his witnesses have any hope of convincing the masses that he was the Messiah. The crucial truth was that “Messiah abides forever” (John 12:34). The patriotic spirit and religious sense of national identity would increasingly exert itself till a generation later the Romans would destroy the Jewish state—as the Book of Acts records time and again. That is also why the resurrection of Jesus had to play such a prominent part in the proclamation about him from Pentecost forward (in the kerygma: Acts 2). For the Jews, a dead Messiah was a contradiction of terms; they had not been expecting a suffering Messiah (John 12:34; Luke 24:25-27, etc.).
Shaking the dust off their feet and running off to another town would no longer be enough for the evangelists’ safety. In more private circumstances, having a sword could at least deter unarmed attackers and citizens taking action on their own (John 16:21). A sword might dissuade critics from “roughing up” the evangelists at a personal level. Even just displaying a sword in its sheath would have a dampening effect on physical opposition.
Of course, using the sword would have limited value against the stronger opposition these workmen would face. There was still the cross that each one had committed themselves to pick up and carry to their own crucifixion (Matthew 10:38; 16:24-26). Official opposition reinforced by authority and force would still bring them into synagogues as local courts for trials and scourgings (Matthew 10:16-20; 34-37). Family members, friends, and neighbors would have access to authorities for getting disciples imprisoned or even executed (Matthew 10:21). We suspect that Saul’s attempt to systematically wipe out the church could have been devastating if the Lord had not intervened to bring about his conversion (Acts 9:1-25; 21:27-26:32ff. + Philippians 3:6; 1 Timothy 1:13). After he became a disciple, the church in Judaea, Samaria, and Galilee had peace (Acts 9:31).
Admittedly, under such circumstances fighting back with a weapon would be pointless; fleeing to another city perhaps outside the country might be an option (Matthew 10:23). Later, after the stoning of Stephen, disciples dispersed even to foreign cities, turning persecution into evangelism (Acts 8:4-8).
Nevertheless, for present purposes, using a sword for self-protection or defending a traveling partner had approval and even advocacy from the Lord. That leaves dealing with the passage below that advocates use to argue for non-violent response.
II. Matthew 5:38-42
This paragraph in the Sermon on the Mount has served as the basis for the various forms of pacificism. Properly reading Jesus’ comments depends on two features of context—general then specific: (1) the Sermon addresses social relations as organized conceptually around the Golden Rule (7:12); and (2) Jesus corrects a longstanding, popular misuse of the Mosaic judicial principle “eye for an eye.” Applying it to social relations transforms it into justification for revenge.
We start with the second point. In three places the Mosaic Law directs judges on handling violent crimes. In a case where men fighting cause a woman to miscarry, Exodus 21:22-25 says,
22“If men are fighting and hit a pregnant woman and she miscarries without further injury, fine him as her husband requires and the judges determine. 23But if there’s further harm, punishf life for life, 24eye for eye, tooth for tooth [Mt 5:38], hand for hand, foot for foot, 25burn for burn, wound for wound, bruise for bruise.” [Conversational Version]
Speaking of citizens and aliens alike, Leviticus 24:20 says,
19“If one person injures another, do the same thing to that person: 20fracture for fracture, eye for eye, tooth for tooth [Mt 5:38].” [CV]
Deuteronomy 19:21 broadens the point to cases of false witnesses,
16“If a malicious witness accuses someone, 17both people will stand in the presence of the LORD, that is, in front of the priests and judges in office. 18The judges will investigate thoroughly. If the witness has accused falsely, 19do to him what he’d intended to do to the fellow citizen. That’s how you’re to purge sin from you. 20The rest of the people will show respect and not do such a sinful thing. 21Don’t show mercy: life for life, eye for eye, tooth for tooth [Mt 5:38], hand for hand, foot for foot.” [CV]
When applied to personal relations, the words of Moses sound like the LORD permits people to “get even” on all kinds of slights and minor disabuses. They might even do that instead of calling the authorities to take care of more significant matters.
Jesus admonished against that misapplication. Instead of wanting to fight “at the drop of a hat,” they were to, so to speak, “turn the other cheek.” Instead of trying to “get back at” someone, “go the second mile.” That mentality derives from the Golden Rule, something especially noticeable in the parallel “Sermon on the Plain” (Luke 6:20-38). There in the layout of the text, the Rule contrasts immediately with “eye for an eye” (6:27-30 + 31). Around the Rule, Luke’s gospel clusters several of the same correctives that Matthew 5-7 records. The Rule describes a pattern of behavior aside from any feelings people might have toward their enemies.
The revenge mentality perpetuates social division and makes it worse because people tend to get “evener.” The first aspect of genius in Jesus’ teaching taps into people’s tendency to respond in kind. Instead of doing so with evil, his Golden Rule asks how we want people to treat us and says to act that way instead of the way the other has treated us. That establishes two related correctives: (a) it halts the pattern of deteriorating associations, and (b) it tends to rebuild relationships because, again, people tend to respond in kind—in this case to our love pattern of behavior. The same “responding in kind” that destroys, Jesus draws on to correct and create. Obviously, to break the downward pattern, at some point doing good must respond to evil, a fact commanded repeatedly in the New Testament: Romans 12:9-21; 1 Thessalonians 5:15; 1 Peter 2:23; 3:9. That is what Jesus calls on his disciples to do.
As the Old Testament texts used overt behaviors to make tangible the principle that judges were to apply, so Jesus uses some tangible behaviors to illustrate his point: turning the other cheek, giving a litigant our coat too, going the second mile, giving to someone in need. A second aspect of genius in Jesus’ teaching is that by turning the other cheek and going the second mile, we take charge of the situation. Instead of following an agenda set by an offender, we set the agenda—with a view to disarming evil.
In all of this, Jesus was not correcting the Law; he was correcting a misappropriation of it (5:17). He reworded the Second Great Commandment (Leviticus 19:18) to establish a mentality and behavior pattern appropriate to the interpersonal circumstance:
“Love / neighbor / as self” becomes
“do / to others / as you would have others do to you.”
Like almost every negative behavior, vengeance comes significantly from a desire to reinforce self-esteem. People are wired to feel valuable, so they try to enhance their sense of self-worth. They often chose to do that by trying to succeed in competition, which makes them feel “good” by being “better than.” That self-defeating method works only for a few and only for a while. Love via the Golden Rule is the closest thing to a universal social “solvent,” treating other people the way we want to be treated helps cure the enemy’s deficiency. So not responding in kind (love) puts victims in charge and changes enemies by eroding the root cause of their sin. Turning the other cheek helps cure vengeance.
These verses bear on the kinds of pacifism that interpreters infer from them. First, Jesus’ examples are relatively minor. They do not correspond to the severity of the ten or so examples the Mosaic legislation gives. Jesus’ illustrations sound more like personal affronts as in “but words will never hurt me.” Jesus’ words encourage us to “be above all that,” “to let it go,” not to react to “petty stuff” people pull to “get at” us. Letting someone slap me in the face is a far cry from letting them break my neck, letting a bully beat up a member of my family, not stopping an attacker from taking my life and leaving my family without a mother, not protecting my people when evil mobs try to take over our land. Stopping such evil requires more than talk, counseling, standing in the way, absorbing punches, running away, calling the police. Law enforcement may not be available; nothing short of lethal force personally exercised will suffice in some situations; that is what using a sword must include. Pacifism does not work for individuals or society.
Jesus’ interpersonal illustrations speak more to a mentality than to specifics, much less to letting someone wound, maim, and kill us or someone near us. Since turning the other cheek contrasts with violent crimes that eye for an eye envisions, Jesus is not contemplating response to such violent acts when he says to turn the other cheek. He is responding to the misuse of those words in everyday social interaction; consequently, he is not advocating pacifism as normally meant. This last element in interpretation invokes the “law of opposition”: a statement means what it contrasts with.
(a) Jesus’ commandment contrasts with the social misapplication of the Mosaic injunction, not with the Mosaic judicial injunction itself.
(b) In addition to Matthew 5 not dealing with offenses of bodily harm,
(c) turning the other cheek contrasts with social vengeance, not with physical force. Refraining from using physical force lies outside Jesus’ frame of reference. Besides,
*(e) revenge happens after an offence in response to it; self-protection occurs at the time of an offence to prevent it. Furthermore,
(f) self-protection means not acting in “my own name” but acting in the absence of official protection, in the absence of representatives of the law, who are normally the ones who do not act in their own name but in the name of the law.
Even aside from Jesus’ words, we agree to not using force beyond what protecting a person from physical or emotional abuse calls for. We even agree with restraining police from using excessive force even though God has constituted human government for that very purpose (Romans 13:1-7; Titus 3:1; 1 Peter 2:13-17).
Purely interpersonal situations bleed off into the executive branch of government and on into complicated international issues including military operations in “just war.” Without specifically addressing that final level here, we note that we live in more than the interpersonal realm; some of us also have to man the police force and supply personnel for military duty. John the Baptist did not tell soldiers to quit their military assignments (Luke 3:14) or government workers to give up collecting taxes (Luke 3:12-13).
As to pacifism, two significant points apply: in police and national service, physical force must operate, but the personnel do not use it in their own name. That likewise applies in self-defense and defense of others, so individuals fulfill the need an absent “authority” would otherwise fulfill. They do so, not of themselves but as surrogates for unavailable resources, not because they want to, but because they have to for necessary purposes; otherwise, there would be no “law and order” whether they were dealing with friend or foe, privately or internationally. The mentality Jesus advocates in Matthew 5 is what operates in “not acting in our own name.”
The conclusion about self-defense and pacifism combines Jesus’ words in Luke 22:35-38 and Matthew 5:38-42. (1) Using a sword sets a limit on turning the other cheek; and, so to speak, turning the cheek sets a limit on “using the sword.” They both speak to a mentality even more than to specifics like the ones Jesus mentions. The Luke passage addressed a more hostile setting in the future; Matthew addressed the purely social setting at any time. The first admonished buying a sword (self-protection); the second admonished not seeking revenge (a mentality).
(2) Putting the admonitions in balance also helps keep the other person “honest.” It is not good to let bullies persist in “slapping ‘me’ around,” to let lazy people keep asking for handouts instead of working (2 Thessalonians 3:11-12), to let people “take advantage of” my willingness to help, or to “let them off the hook” for not fulfilling their responsibilities: “Every person is to bear their own burden” (Galatians 6:5) even while it is true that “we are to bear one another’s burdens and so fulfill the law of Christ” (Galatians 6:2). Without feeling guilty or unfaithful, “I” can prioritize my responsibilities, my family’s need for my time and attention, and so on.
(3) Even more broadly, “I” can evaluate what is appropriate given the complex of variables every case involves. Balancing Matthew 5 and Luke 22 opens up our using “sliding-scale judgment” between people and along the way with individual people as they change. “I” can be more willing to let other people’s actions “slide” whose mental conditions, emotional strength, abilities, background, and opportunities are not below normal. “I” can exercise greater patience with people that are showing progress. “I” can judge whether the seventh of “77 repentances” is genuine (Matthew 18:22-35). Besides, we cannot always be sure how to respond even when we prioritize an enemy’s welfare. Sometimes even opposite responses may be morally appropriate as referenced to “my” motive and attitude in given situations. In other words, even with Matthew and Luke in balance, we may not follow a set pattern across all persons or continuously with the same person; real situations have too many features for static verdicts. Such factors issue from the complexities of relationships between persons.
Jesus advocated a mentality in Matthew (subjective) as balanced in Luke by the real world we face in life and ministry (objective). Those inclinations lean on each other for good whether for us or our enemies
________
1The number of women who ministered alongside the group is unclear, some being relatives of the apostles: Matthew 27:55-56; Mark 15:40-41; Luke 8:1-3; 23:49 (cp. John 19:25). Two swords sufficed for whatever the private need for them was.
2(a) “Interpersonal” corresponds better with the kingdom that the New Testament characterizes. (b) “Within youpl,” however, pictures something individualistic within one person after another. That arrangement better describes the indwelling presence of the s/Spirit. But the kingdom is for creating “a new united mankind” and for “reconciling” persons alienated by sin against one another (Ephesians 2:14-22). The Golden Rule (love) addresses reciprocal action between persons. “Kingdom” itself means a unity of individuals. Interpersonal can include vertical unity with our personal God as well. “Within you” leaves out the connection between the individuals.
(c) “Among you” leaves out the individuals that comprise the whole. It resembles fog among trees in a valley. What is among the trees does not include the trees.
(d) Taking “among” as meaning the King who stands for the kingdom may avoid this last limitation, but it does not track well with preceding comments about “not here or there” and “not coming with observation.”
3Matthew alone uses “kingdom of heaven.” Nine times he puts it in place of “kingdom of God” in the other gospels: Matthew 4:17 (= Mark 1:15); 5:3 (= Luke 6:20); 11:11 (=Luke 7:28); 13:11 (= Mark 4:11; Luke 8:10); 13:24 (= Mark 4:25); 13:31 (= Mark 4:20); 10:7 (= Luke 9:2); 19:14 (= Mark 10:14; Luke 18:16); 19:23 (= Mark 10:23; Luke 18:24). Matthew 19:23-24 uses both designations in the scope of two verses in a repeated statement, one title then the other. That shows he meant the same thing by both expressions. Besides indicating that the kingdom was not of this world, he may have used “heaven” as the prodigal son did (Luke 15:18, 24): as a metonym for God.
4Protection from persecution seems more to lie within the responsibilities of an angel (Acts 5:17-42; 12:1-19).
5As in so many Christian issues, we understand the kingdom of God/heaven and the church in relation to the Big Four: interpersonal, driven by influence; natural, driven by force; legal, driven by authority; and metaphysical, driven by form. A legal cause does not produce an interpersonal result. A natural effect does not come from a logical syllogism, and so forth.
6For these points further elaborated, see on this website Christian Evidences < Apologetics Part 1, pp. 27-32.