Curious Christian

Given the history of authoritarian religion, colonial missions, and coercive churches, it is an understandable question. Many people hear “there is one true God” not as liberation, but as conquest. Christians cannot honestly discuss this question without acknowledging the real harm done in the name of God. Yet the history of biblical monotheism is more complicated than the simple story of religion flowing naturally toward domination.

Historically, Jewish monotheism became most sharply defined not in imperial triumph, but during the Babylonian captivity. Israel’s clearest declarations that God alone is sovereign emerged while politically powerless, displaced, and living beneath an imperial boot. In that context, monotheism functioned not as the theology of conquest, but of resistance. Babylon was not ultimate. Its kings were not ultimate. Its very gods stood beneath a higher moral reality.

Relativism is often easier for comfortable societies than for suffering ones, because those confronting tyranny tend to ask what, if anything, stands above power itself. If truth is merely tribal or constructed, then empire simply becomes the strongest construction.

At the same time, oppressed movements are not automatically virtuous. History repeatedly shows that communities formed in resistance can themselves become coercive once they gain power. Christianity is no exception. The faith that once stood before empire in martyrdom later too often stood beside empire in triumphalism. Remembering Babylon is not enough. Christians must also remember how easily the wounded can become wounders when they forget the cross.

There is also an irony hidden within the original question. To call monotheism intrinsically tyrannical is already to appeal to some standard of justice higher than mere preference, tribe, or power itself. The critique tacitly assumes that some forms of authority are genuinely oppressive and others genuinely good. In that sense, the argument has already moved partly beyond relativism.

Part of the fear surrounding monotheism is the assumption that one God means one totalising system beneath which every difference must disappear. Yet the biblical imagination is more complex than that. Scripture speaks of powers, principalities, spiritual beings, and cosmic conflict. The claim that one God stands above all things was not necessarily a denial that many powers exist, but a refusal to grant any power ultimate status. Even the gods of empire stood beneath judgment.

Ultimately, Christianity stands or falls on Jesus Christ. The Christian claim is not simply that there is one God, but that ultimate reality is revealed through a person who rejected coercion, rebuked religious power, loved enemies, and was executed by the state rather than conquering it. The centre of Christianity is not a golden throne but a rugged cross. Whenever Christianity ceases to critique domination and instead sanctifies it, it betrays its own centre.