Then Jesus asked them, “When I sent you without purse, bag or sandals, did you lack anything?” “Nothing,” they answered.

He said to them, “But now if you have a purse, take it, and also a bag; and if you don’t have a sword, sell your cloak and buy one. It is written: ‘And he was numbered with the transgressors'[b]; and I tell you that this must be fulfilled in me. Yes, what is written about me is reaching its fulfillment.”

The disciples said, “See, Lord, here are two swords.” “That is enough,” he replied.

(Luke 22:35-38)

If you’ve ever studied this passage from Luke 22, you’re sure to have come away with, at the very least, a modicum of uncertainty and perhaps a fair amount of confusion as well. While it’s quite simple in its construction, the ridiculously large number of interpretations that are assigned to it makes it a troubling passage from an exegetical perspective.

What makes this passage so difficult to interpret, however, is not the obscurity of its words, but rather the ends to which different interpreters press the passage. Principally, this passage is used by many to advocate something of a justification of Christian violence-through-self-defense, while others use the passage More >