Issues & Answers: Human Rights

By staff - Mar 28, 2006 - comment

While we may believe otherwise, the concept of human rights is not unique to the twenty-first century. The Charter of Liberties (also known as the Coronation Charter), proclaimed by Henry I of England in 1100 and a forerunner of the Magna Carta, bound the king to the law, thereby constraining the reach of the monarchy and establishing some rights for a segment of Great Britain’s population that previously had none.

While not intended as a codification of rights owed to citizens, the Magna Carta, a document granted by England’s King John in 1215 under “considerable duress,” is regarded as an early proclamation of the liberties due certain citizens and a defense against arbitrary rule and injustice.

The Magna Carta hinted at the fact that the power of the state could be constricted by the people and that no man is above the law, even the king. For the most part it concerned itself only with the liberties of the aristocracy and the business class; commoners lacked such protection.

Yet it stood as an inspiration to the settlers of the American colonies, who were intent on eliminating the oversight of English royalty. This document was a historical precedent to the Declaration of Independence.

As man is created in God’s image and is a unique creation, we can state that human rights are God-given and self-evident. The Declaration of Independence says men are “endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights, that among them are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.”

“Everyone has the right to freedom of thought, conscience and religion,” says Article 18 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, adopted by the United Nations in 1948.

This declaration identifies “the recognition of the inherent dignity and the equal and inalienable rights of all members of the human family” as the “foundation of freedom, justice and peace in the world.”

So even absent a proclamation by the state, individuals have certain universal rights, including freedom of thought, conscience, and religion, which should not be abridged or denied. Nonetheless, throughout history peoples’ basic freedoms have been encumbered by governments intent on maintaining their power and controlling their citizens’ activities.

Unfortunately, even in the modern world, human rights violations are common. Tragically few of these incidents make the headlines. In more recent times, we have seen, for example, North Koreans abused and sentenced to work camps at the command of dictator Kim Jong-Il. Many people, fearing for their lives, have fled to neighboring China, only to be repatriated to their homeland—often to their death. In the Sudan’s western region of Darfur, 2 million people have been driven from their homes, and countless innocent people have been tortured, raped, and even slaughtered by the militant group Janjaweed, which is supported by their own government. And throughout the world, young women and children are bought and sold into a modern form of slavery, the sex trafficking industry. The abuses are horrific and real. Sadly, the list of abuses does not end here.

The Issue:

“After a while, they disconnected the wire from my finger and connected it to my ear. They immediately gave a high dose of electricity. My whole body shook in a terrible way. My front teeth started breaking. At the same time my torturers would hold a mirror to my face and say: ‘Look what is happening to your lovely green eyes. Soon you will not be able to see at all. You will lose your mind. You see, you have already started bleeding in your mouth.¹’” This testimony by a 23-year-old woman is only one of literally thousands that are being reported from around the world. Victims hang for days by handcuffs from their jail cells. They are injected with psychoactive drugs that drive them insane. Their wills are broken by the torture of their children before them. Inhumanities beyond description occur constantly around the world.

Freedom House, in its 2005 study of human rights and religious freedom worldwide, finds that 89 nations are completely free, while 58 are partly free and 45 are not free. These partly free and not free nations account for 1,157,700,000 and 2,331,200,000 people, respectively².

The horrors of human rights violations are not limited to the deliberate torture policies of dictatorships. There is also the torture of neglect. Citizens suffer the prolonged agony of starvation, ignorance, and disease while their governments invest their countries’ resources in war, personal fortunes, or in police-state oppression to prop up their unpopular governments.

Christian compassion will not let us close our eyes, ears, and hearts to those whose screams of anguish are being heard around the world.

History and Definition

Interest in the basic rights of persons beyond one’s own political borders is not just a modern phenomenon. In 480 B.C. Gelon, prince of Syracuse, defeated Carthage in war. He made it a condition of peace that the Carthaginians abandon their custom of sacrificing their children to Saturn³.

The idea that there are certain inalienable human rights that no person, government, or institution can take away from people has flourished throughout history. In our modern culture, this idea found clear expression in the English Bill of Rights, the French Declaration of the Rights of Man, and the United States’ Declaration of Independence and Constitution, with its many human rights amendments, including the Bill of Rights, the first 10 Amendments.

The World War II-era atrocities extended the concern of many beyond the rights of their own citizens to persons of all nations. This concern is reflected in the Atlantic Charter of 1941 and the United Nations Charter and its accompanying Universal Declaration of Human Rights in 1948. During the next three decades, little progress was made in implementing the provisions of these documents. There was also a growing feeling among many, especially in the developing nations, that the 1940s statements were incomplete. For example, there was little attention given to economic rights or to the specific needs of ethnic, linguistic, and religious minorities.

This three-decade discussion finally produced in 1976 the International Bill of Human Rights. There are two major divisions of this document. The first one deals with economic, social, and cultural rights. The rights defined include the right to freedom from hunger, the right to work, the right to join trade unions, the right to social security, the right to education, the right to health care, and others. These rights reflect the interests expressed primarily by the developing nations.

The second division of the International Bill of Human Rights deals with civil and political rights. This includes the right to life, to liberty of movement, to equal treatment before the courts, to freedom of thought, conscience, and religion, to freedom of expression, to the right of peaceful assembly, and many others. Also, there are prohibitions against torture, slavery, arbitrary arrest, retroactive criminal legislation, and others. Here we see reflected those rights that most Americans recognize and with which we readily identify.

A major source of misunderstanding is that in some countries human rights are thought of in terms of economic or social rights while in others the emphasis is on political rights. This difference contributes to some of the charges of hypocrisy. Nation A charges Nation B with flagrant violation of human rights because it has political prisoners. Nation B retorts that Nation A has no right to make such charges as long as they tolerate widespread poverty in their land.

Christian Impulses

When confronted by challenges related to human rights, certain insights and impulses spring forth from our Christian experience and from our Christian tradition. These impulses give both motivation and direction for our response to the world’s cry for human rights.

The Reality of Evil

Most people recoil from ever hearing about the depth and extent of human rights violations at home and abroad. As Christians, we cannot recoil because we know the truth of human sin. We are the people of the Cross, who stood and watched the most innocent of all suffer and die because of human sin. We know the reality and pervasiveness of the kingdom of evil, and we have faced it and confessed it in our own lives. Of all people, we are the least able to deny or ignore the reality of human rights violations. Those who have naive views of human nature can pretend that all is right with the world or can ignore the problems in the hope that they will go away. The Christian conscience, however, burns with an awareness of human sin and suffering. We are particularly able to face such tragedy, admit its reality, and challenge it.

The God of Power and Love

The Christian sees the Cross from this side of the Resurrection. While the Cross reflects the capacity of human sin, the Resurrection proclaims the powerful love of a God whose compassion for human life is stronger than Satan’s passion for death. We know that something can be done. God is on the side of those who suffer. The power and victory of the Resurrection will not let us flee from the task of challenging those who violate the rights of humans. To shrink from this task would be to deny the purpose and power of God.

A Tradition of Suffering

The Christian church was born as a suffering group, persecuted by both the religious and political powers. Evangelicals have an even more recent tradition of identifying with those whose human rights were denied. Our forebears knew the terror of being the persecuted minority. Out of these experiences, they have often been the leaders in pressing for human rights for themselves and others. Because of this tradition, we should be quick to respond to God’s charge in Hebrews 13:3, “Remember the prisoners, as though you were in prison with them, and the mistreated, as though you yourselves were suffering bodily.”

The Value of Human Life

The Christian understands that the God of the Bible, who has shown us His face in Jesus Christ, relentlessly loves humankind. God creates each life in His own image (Gen. 1:26-27). The Bible is a great love story of how God, through the centuries and against repeated barriers, pursues humankind in order that each person may have life eternal and life abundantly. Every hair on every head is numbered (Matt. 10:30). The supreme act of God’s love for human life is His incarnation in Jesus Christ. Becoming one of us, God performed the ultimate act of commitment to human life. None of us who knows this God as revealed in Christ can forget that every act of cruelty done to the least of these victims is done to Christ (Matt. 25:40, 45).

The Pros and Cons:

Renewed interest in human rights in recent years has spawned significant resistance. Many view this interest as too idealistic and impractical. Others see the pursuit of human rights as being in conflict with the basic interests of our nation and of our society. Let’s examine the arguments.

A self-righteous crusade? Some see this recent emphasis as an expression of moral arrogance. They contend that it casts those who push for human rights in the role of self-righteous judges who seek to remake society and the world in their own image. This challenge to an aggressive human rights policy at home and abroad fails to distinguish between authentic morality and fraudulent moralism. Behind this challenge lies the hidden assumption that there is no place for morality in government policy. The Christian’s concern that his government’s policy reflects basic moral values need not lead to arrogant self-righteousness. The first step in a human rights policy should be an aggressive search for justice within our own borders. There are inequities in our judicial and economic systems. There is discrimination against women, minorities, the weak, the poor, and unpopular groups. Christians should lead in resisting these domestic violations of human rights not only because it is right, but also because it authenticates the wider efforts being put forth by our government and through our mission enterprises.

Antagonizes our adversaries? Some contend that a strong human rights emphasis irritates our political enemies, complicating efforts to improve or normalize relations with them. It is said to be ideological warfare and to reduce the chances for peaceful relations. Furthermore, the argument continues, our criticisms may serve to harden them into more oppressive human rights policies. Soviet dissenter Andrei Sakharov disagrees: “Resolute and ever-growing pressure by public and official bodies of the West—up to the highest—the defense of principles and of specific people can only bring positive results. Every case of human rights violation must become a political problem for the leaders of the culprit countries.⁴” Furthermore, improved relations at home and abroad can be built only between those who respect all human rights and who respect each other. Freedom and tyranny can never be friends.

Alienates our allies? There is a fear that our allies will be insulted by our meddling in the internal affairs of other countries and that we cannot afford to alienate them with such a policy. Besides, this argument continues, we should be loyal to our friends and not embarrass or weaken them. This perspective fails to recognize that the greatest threat to a nation’s stability is internal corruption and injustice. A government that can maintain itself only through oppressive rule is inherently unstable. Such “one-bullet regimes” have proved to be subject to frequent revolutions and an easy target for extremists. Finally, such governments have not proven to be good allies. “Governments which systematically disregard the rights of their own people are not likely to respect the rights of other nations and other people and are likely to seek their objectives by coercion and force in the international field.⁵” While there are dangers to be avoided, an aggressive human rights policy is not only possible, but in the long run is also in the best interest of the United States and all other nations committed to justice. Christians must insist that their governments stand not for raw power but for power used justly. The power God gives governments is to serve human needs, and is not to be perverted to injustice and cruelty (Ps. 82:1-2; Isa. 1:23).

Some Answers:

Christians should encourage and support political leaders who champion human rights in both domestic and international policy.
Christians should be aware of the reports of such groups as Amnesty International, Freedom House, and the International League for Human Rights, understanding they are not approaching the issue from a biblical worldview, but discovering ways in which we, as ordinary citizens, can help.
Christians should encourage their pastors and churches to use their witness and influence to promote human rights, knowing that “where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom” (2 Cor. 3:17).
Christians should support denominational agencies and leaders, especially those in foreign missions, who seek to bear witness against abuses of human rights.

Christians should remind governments that states do not create human rights and therefore are never justified in taking them away. States can recognize and protect human rights or deny and abuse them. Human rights, however, are God’s creation; and what God has made and given no individual or government on earth has any right to take away.

Notes

¹ Amnesty International, Report on Torture (New York: Farrar, Straus and Girous, 1975), 13-14.

² Freedom House, Freedom in the World, 2006, http://www.freedomhouse.org/template.cfm?page=15&year=2005 .

³ Walter Laqueur, “The Issue of Human Rights,” Commentary (May 1977), 29.

⁴ Ibid., 32.

⁵ Ibid., 33.

Further Learning

Learn more about: Citizenship, Human Rights

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