The ethnic fallacy and its kin

The presence of ethnic groups outside their homeland sometimes leads to claims that the homeland government should annex the territories where these emigres are a majority. This has been used as a pretext for Russia’s invasion of the Crimea and Ukraine, China’s claim to Taiwan, Hamas’ invasion of Israel, among others. But migration has been a fact of life for all of recorded history, and noted at least in Genesis 11:8-9, in which God was the author of spreading people across the earth, and it was directly linked to people speaking different languages. He also spells out His purpose in doing so, in Genesis 11:6-7, that He did not want the people of the earth to be one people with a single language, because nothing would be impossible for them. In other words, they would rebel against God, and He would have to complete what he almost did in Noah’s day (Genesis 6:5-7). So different languages and migration both stem directly from God’s action in the days of the Tower of Babel.

Modern wars to reunite separated ethnic groups appear to be of the same genre, that the rulers of large, relatively homogeneous groups want to magnify their power by bringing distant groups under their authority. And we know that in the last days, this effort will be completed, although more on the basis of enforced religious observance than language or ethnicity. (Revelation 13:16-17) I infer that the same spirit that will empower the antichrist and false prophet in the last days is goading contemporary rulers.

 Having this as the root cause of these wars, we can see the futility of trying to resolve these conflicts with human logic, reasoning, appeals to conscience or morality, etc. War is hell, and the people who instigate them know full well that is what they are creating, because the demons of hell are prodding them in this direction. Efforts to get resolution on a human level can at best achieve temporary cessations in hostilities. It’s like trying to steer a semi by pushing on the back of the trailer.

 Jesus told His disciples that there was one condition for His return to earth in the Great Commission. “Go, therefore, and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, teaching them to follow all that I commanded you; and behold, I am with you always, to the end of the age.” (Matthew 28:19-20, NASB) ‘All nations’ explicitly uses the Greek word ethnos, which refers variously to nations, tribes, gentiles, people-groups, and panta, the Greek word for all.

 The choice is stark. Language groups were separated because of the sinful aspirations of the builders of the Tower of Babel to become powerful so that they could operate without being subject to God (presumably to not be constrained by His nature and character) to make a name for themselves. That spirit continues to this day. Rulers of large nations want to do this, hence wars and threats of wars. Jesus told us that the good news of the forgiveness of sins through the acceptance of His sacrifice must be taken to every language and ethnic group, to overcome sin and enable humankind to live out the nature and character of God. Language groups were created as a mitigation for sin, not an incentive for it!

 And so, the conclusion is that we live in a world with wars and rumors of war, and must nonetheless work to spread the gospel. It is wrong to think that remote people of a certain ethnicity must be politically and militarily united; they must be evangelized!