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Religious Norms and Behavior in War

Marko Popović

Abstract

ln this essay, the author deals with the influence of religious norms on behaviour in war. Defining war as a specific state of anomy, with violence as its main content, and Christian ethics as absolute, universal ethics, the author sets a thesis that the influence of the three most important religious norms, relevant for the Christian understanding of violence and war, “Do not kill”, “Do not hate” and “Love your enemy”, decrease considerably during the war. Briefly describing the history of Roman Catholic Church and its attitude towards war, the author ascertains that the Church itself, when introducing the idea of “righteous war”, sets the relativity of the norm “Do not kill”, and, indirectly, the relativity of other two norms. At the very end of his work, using the war in Croatia as an example, the author describes decreasing influence of already mentioned religious norms. Traumatic experiences and biotic motives have in war more important influence on behaviour than religious norms.

Keywords

war; Christian ethics; religious norms; Catholicism; war in Croatia

Hrčak ID:

202419

URI

https://hrcak.srce.hr/202419

Publication date:

10.6.1998.

Article data in other languages: croatian

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