A Religion of Peace?: Why Christianity Is and Islam Isn't

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Representative of the latter, was William Wilberforce who thought that strict limits should be imposed on British involvement in the French Revolutionary Wars based on Christian ideals of peace and brotherhood. Thinking About Peace in History" by Charles Chatfield, in The Pacifist Impulse in Historical Perspective: Essays in Honour of Peter Brock, edited by Harvey L. Love your enemies, do good to those who hate you, bless those who curse you, pray for those who abuse you. While many governments have tolerated pacifist views and even accommodated pacifists' refusal to fight in wars, others at times have outlawed pacifist and anti-war activity. Dietrich Bonhoeffer Works Volume 2: Act and Being: Transcendental Philosophy and Ontology in Systematic Theology; Minneapolis, Fortress, 1996.

Pacifism is the opposition or resistance to war, militarism (including conscription and mandatory military service) or violence.

Many religions such as Buddhism, Hinduism and Sikhism teach the principle of ahimsa - non-violence or doing no harm. Dr King believed that Jesus had preached a message that you should love everyone, including your enemies. Tolstoy's work inspired a movement named after him advocating pacifism to arise in Russia and elsewhere. In addition to the traditional peace churches, some of the many groups that protested against the war were the Woman's Peace Party (which was organized in 1915 and led by noted reformer Jane Addams), the International Committee of Women for Permanent Peace (ICWPP) (also organized in 1915), [50] the American Union Against Militarism, the Fellowship of Reconciliation and the American Friends Service Committee.

Some commentators on the most nonviolent forms of pacifism, including Jan Narveson, argue that such pacifism is a self-contradictory doctrine. On the level of society, Bahá'u'lláh promotes the principle of collective security, which does not abolish the use of force, but prescribes "a system in which Force is made the servant of Justice". All four schools of Sunni jurisprudence, as well as the Shi’ite tradition make no reference to a ‘greater jihad’. We utterly deny all outward wars and strife, and fightings with outward weapons, for any end, or under any pretense whatever; this is our testimony to the whole world.Shoghi Effendi, the head of the Baháʼí Faith in the first half of the 20th century, noted that in the Baháʼí view, absolute pacifists are anti-social and exalt the individual over society which could lead to anarchy; instead he noted that the Baháʼí conception of social life follows a moderate view where the individual is not suppressed or exalted.