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E. Janet Warren*
University of Birmingham, Edgbaston, Birmingham, UK, B15 2TT
e.janet.warren@rogers.com
Abstract
The term ‘spiritual warfare’, referring to the Christian’s battle with evil spirits, was popular-
ized by the Pentecostal/Charismatic movement and is the predominant language used in
contemporary Christianity to describe encounters with evil spirits. This paper reviews
the prevalence of military metaphors in popular and scholarly writings, and examines
the problems associated with warfare language from linguistic, biblical, theological and
psycho-social perspectives. I suggest that ‘spiritual warfare’ has become a dead metaphor:
its metaphorical insights have been lost and other metaphors are neglected. Therefore
renewed attention to metaphor theory is needed along with alternative language with
which to discuss demonology and deliverance. I conclude with suggestions for supplemen-
tary metaphors/models, including cleansing, setting boundaries on evil, appropriating
divine authority, and using light/dark imagery.
Keywords
spiritual warfare, violence, metaphor, demonology
everyday life).1 However, there are multiple concerns with the exclusive use
of warfare language and imagery.
The aim of this paper is to review and critique the use of military meta-
phors in contemporary Western Christianity as well as to offer some alter-
native metaphors. First, I discuss the prevalence of ‘spiritual warfare’
imagery in popular and academic literature. Second, I point out the numer-
ous problems with warfare imagery under the categories of linguistic (con-
temporary metaphor theory), biblical, theological, and psycho-social.
Finally, I suggest some alternative metaphors that do not employ warfare
language. This discussion is limited to contemporary Western Christian
ity and does not include the use of military metaphors in socio-political
contexts.
Although warfare imagery has been used throughout history with respect
to demonology, the term ‘spiritual warfare’ became established in the con-
text of charismatic renewal. Interest in evil spirits and deliverance has
coincided and perhaps increased with the three waves of charismatic
revival.2 Pentecostalism incorporated a renewed interest in demonology
that gained momentum in the 1950’s and the latter rain movement. The
term ‘spiritual warfare’ was popularized in 1970 as the title of a book
by Michael Harper, a leader in the British charismatic movement.3 In
the 1980’s the interest spread to non-Pentecostal evangelicals. There is
now a blurring of charismatic/Pentecostal/evangelical boundaries with
respect to ‘spiritual warfare’.4 The term has been used by charismatics,5
1.1. Popular Literature
6 E.g. Charles H. Kraft, Defeating Dark Angels (Ann Arbor: Servant, 1992); Neil T.
Anderson and Timothy M. Warner, A Beginner’s Guide to Spiritual Warfare (Ventura, CA:
Regal, 2008).
7 John Bolt, ‘Satan is Alive and Well in Contemporary Imagination: A Bibliographic
Essay with Notes on “Hell” and “Spiritual Warfare”’, Calvin Theological Journal 29 (1994),
pp. 497-506.
8 E.g. Nabeel T. Jabbour, The Unseen Reality: A Panoramic View of Spiritual Warfare
(Singapore: Navigators Singapore, 1995).
9 E.g. Jay E. Adams, The War Within: A Biblical Strategy for Spiritual Warfare (Eugene, OR:
Harvest House Publishers, 1989).
10 Quin Sherrer and Ruthanne Galrock, A Woman’s Guide to Spiritual Warfare (Ann
Arbor, MI: Servant, 1991).
11 Frank and Ida Mae Hammond, Pigs in the Parlour (Kirkwood, MN: Impact Books,
1973), p. 33.
12 Mark I. Bubeck, The Adversary (Chicago: Moody, 1975), p. 70.
13 George Mallone, Arming for Spiritual Warfare (Downers Grove: IVP, 1991), pp. 21-38.
14 Timothy Warner, Spiritual Warfare (Wheaton: Crossway, 1991).
15 E.g. C. Peter Wagner, Confronting the Powers: How the New Testament Church
Experienced the Power of Strategic-Level Spiritual Warfare (Ventura, CA: Regal, 1996), pp. 21-
22. For a critique of this concept, see René Holvast, Spiritual Mapping in the United States
and Argentina, 1989-2005: A Geography of Fear (Leiden: Brill, 2008).
E.J. Warren / Journal of Pentecostal Theology 21 (2012) 278–297 281
1.2. Scholarly Perspectives
In Old Testament theology, warfare language has been used with respect to
the ‘divine warrior’ motif. Longman and Reid assert that this is ‘one of the
most pervasive of all biblical themes’.21 They discuss passages that name
God a warrior,22 and infer this from verses describing God’s presence dur-
ing Israel’s battles.23 This theme continues in the New Testament: Jesus
‘battles’ demonic forces and sends out an ‘army’.24 Christians are ‘holy war-
riors of Christ’ who participate in the spiritual battle. Among New
Testament scholars there is a long tradition of using warfare language to
describe Jesus’ encounters with evil spirits.25 Susan Garrett views much of
Luke as spiritual warfare.26 Graham Twelftree also sees Jesus’ exorcisms as
an eschatological battle and argues that the battles in Mark are cosmic and
spiritual, and that John views Jesus’ entire ministry as a ‘battle with Satan
or the demonic’.27 Pauline scholar, Clinton Arnold, discusses ‘spiritual war-
fare’ using the following subheadings: ‘kingdoms in conflict’, ‘arming for
spiritual warfare’, and ‘demonic strongholds’.28
More concerning is God at War, a biblical theology of ‘spiritual warfare’,
by theologian Gregory Boyd.29 Although his thorough examination of the
entire biblical drama is commendable, Boyd’s work contains frequent
and sometimes excessive warfare language. Boyd presupposes that any-
thing in opposition to God means battle.30 He claims the Kingdom of God,
and therefore the kingdom of Satan, is a military concept.31 ‘Jesus’ miracles
over nature, as well as his healings, exorcisms, and especially his resurrec-
tion, were definite acts of war that accomplished and demonstrated his
victory over Satan’.32 In discussing Jesus’ teaching for the church, Boyd
believes we are to throw ‘all we have into guerrilla warfare against the occu-
pying army’.33 For Paul, ‘the whole of the Christian life is an act of warring
against the enemy’.34 Interestingly, on one occasion Boyd suggests a non-
warfare metaphor without elaboration: he compares demons with ‘viruses
that cannot survive long on their own; they need to infect someone or
something’.35
Even many of those who critique ‘spiritual warfare’ literature continue to
use warfare language. D.A. Carson, who criticizes Boyd’s work, does not
27 Graham H. Twelftree, Jesus the Miracle Worker (Downers Grove: IVP, 1999), p. 67; idem,
In the Name of Jesus (Grand Rapids: Baker, 2007), pp. 96, 115, 127, 195-96.
28 Clinton E. Arnold, 3 Crucial Questions about Spiritual Warfare (Grand Rapids: Baker,
1997), pp. 19, 44, 54-65.
29 Gregory A. Boyd, God at War: The Bible and Spiritual Conflict (Downers Grove: IVP,
1997). This book is the first of two, the second being philosophical (Satan and the Problem of
Evil, Downers Grove: IVP, 2001). Boyd’s aim is to argue against a classical Augustinian view of
evil as always divinely ordained. He has mostly been critiqued for his philosophical stance
on open theism. Interestingly, in later works on other topics in which he mentions evil spir-
its Boyd uses minimal warfare language (e.g. The Myth of a Christian Nation [Grand Rapids:
Zondervan, 2005], pp. 20-48).
30 ‘God’s good creation has in fact been seized by hostile, evil, cosmic forces … God
wages war against these forces … Christ has now secured the overthrow of the evil cosmic
army’ (Boyd, God at War, p. 19).
31 Boyd, God at War, p. 185.
32 Boyd, God at War, p. 213.
33 Matthew 16.18-19; Boyd, God at War, p. 217.
34 Based on Eph. 6.10-17; Boyd, God at War, p. 281.
35 Boyd, God at War, p. 195. This appears contradictory to his insistence that demons are
autonomous beings.
E.J. Warren / Journal of Pentecostal Theology 21 (2012) 278–297 283
36 D.A. Carson, ‘God, the Bible and Spiritual Warfare: A Review Article’, JETS 42.2 (June,
1999), pp. 251-69. He agrees that we ‘are indeed in a warfare situation’ (p. 266).
37 Paul G. Hiebert, ‘Spiritual Warfare and Worldviews’, Direction 29.2 (2000), pp. 114-24.
See also idem, Anthropological Reflections on Missiological Issues (Grand Rapids: Baker,
1994), pp. 203-15.
38 Especially in his concluding chapter, ‘God’s Holy War’. Nigel G. Wright, A Theology of
the Dark Side: Putting the Power of Evil in Its Place (Downers Grove: IVP, 2003), pp. 80-91; also
pp. 173-77.
39 Randy Friesen, ‘Equipping Principles for Spiritual Warfare’, Direction 29.2, (2000),
pp. 142-52.
40 Jacques Theron, ‘A Critical Overview of the Church’s Ministry of Deliverance from Evil
Spirits’, Pneuma 18 (Spring, 1996), pp. 79-92.
41 Anthony N.S. Lane, The Unseen World: Christian Reflections on Angels, Demons, and the
Heavenly Realm (Carlisle: Paternoster Press, 1996).
42 Stephen F. Noll, Angels of Light, Powers of Darkness (Downers Grove: IVP, 1998).
43 Stanley M. Burgess (ed.), Encyclopedia of Pentecostal and Charismatic Christianity
(New York: Routledge, 2006). The section on ‘Deliverance’ uses the term (pp. 123-26).
44 Robert Guelich, ‘Spiritual Warfare: Jesus, Paul and Peretti’, Pneuma 13.1 (1991),
pp. 33-64 (34).
284 E.J. Warren / Journal of Pentecostal Theology 21 (2012) 278–297
2.1. Linguistic
45 Guelich, as mentioned above, and Andrew Walker who states, ‘the literalizing of par-
able and metaphor becomes an occupational hazard in the paranoid universe’ (Walker, ‘The
Devil You Think You Know: Demonology and the Charismatic Movement’, in Tom Smail,
Andrew Walker, and Nigel Wright, Charismatic Renewal: The search for a Theology [London:
C.S. Lewis Centre/ SPCK, 1993], pp. 86-105, [100]).
46 Janet Martin Soskice, Metaphor and Religious Language (Oxford: Oxford University
Press, 1985), p. 15.
47 Sallie McFague believes this tension is critical to theology (Metaphorical Theology:
Models of God in Religious Language [Philadelphia: Fortress, 1982], p. 65).
48 The view of metaphor as cognitive was originated by I.A. Richards (The Philosophy of
Rhetoric [Oxford University Press, 1936]), expanded upon by Max Black (Models and
Metaphors: Studies in Language and Philosophy [Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1962], esp.
pp. 25-47), and applied to theology by Paul Ricoeur (The Rule of Metaphor: Multi-disciplinary
Studies of the Creation of Meaning in Language [Trans. Robert Czerny, Toronto: University of
Toronto Press, 1977]), Soskice (Metaphor and Religious Language) and others.
49 The idea of conceptual metaphors was developed by George Lakoff and Mark Johnson
(Metaphors we Live by [Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1980]) and has been very influ-
ential. They argue that metaphors are based on conceptual correspondence between ideas,
not simply similarities. Metaphors are largely irreducible and non-translatable; they perme-
ate thoughts and actions, and reflect our worldviews.
50 Black, Models and Metaphors, p. 236.
E.J. Warren / Journal of Pentecostal Theology 21 (2012) 278–297 285
2.2. Biblical
58 E.g. Job 26.7-14; 38.4-11, Pss. 74.12-17; 89.5-14; 104.5-9; Isa. 51.9, 10; Nah. 1.4. Chaos is per-
sonified in monsters such as Leviathan (E.g. Ps. 74.14; Isa. 27.1). Boyd devotes two chapters to
this theme: ‘Locking up the Raging Sea’ and ‘Slaying Leviathan’.
E.J. Warren / Journal of Pentecostal Theology 21 (2012) 278–297 287
67 Guelich, ‘Jesus, Paul & Peretti’, p. 41. This juxtaposition is common in popular ‘spiritual
warfare’ literature.
68 Matthew 13.39; Guelich, ‘Jesus, Paul & Peretti’, p. 37.
69 Guelich, ‘Jesus, Paul & Peretti’, p. 42.
70 Guelich, ‘Jesus, Paul & Peretti’, p. 45.
71 E.g. Col. 1.29; Heb. 12.4.
72 Matthew 10.1, Mk. 3.15; 6.7, Lk. 9.1; 10.19.
73 Hiebert, ‘Spiritual Warfare and Worldviews’, p. 119.
74 Luke 15.21-24 and Mt. 21.33-44. He does not elaborate on these metaphors.
75 Hiebert, Anthropological Perspectives, p. 211.
E.J. Warren / Journal of Pentecostal Theology 21 (2012) 278–297 289
2.3. Theological
There has been very little academic work done on demonology and deliv-
erance by systematic theologians. Most discussions about evil occur
through the lens of philosophy and seldom mention evil spirits. Elsewhere,
demons are demythologized or viewed as psychological projections, not
metaphors that depict reality.76 Boyd’s work is an exception, and he is help-
ful in his suggestion that to understand evil we need to focus on the
complexities of creation not the mysteries of God (which philosophical
approaches tend to do).77 Because of the lack of academic treatment of the
subject, ‘spiritual warfare’ is often associated with radical groups, and is
consequently dismissed. This does a disservice to those on the front-lines
of ministry who need to know how to deal with demonized people. The
plethora of popular books on ‘spiritual warfare’ indicates a hunger for
information on the subject; the lack of healthy food available from the
academy has led consumers to gorge on fast food.78
Another concern with ‘spiritual warfare’ from a theological perspective
is that the concept is largely theocentric; there is a focus on God as the
‘divine warrior’, and by extension, Christ, the conqueror who engages in
‘power struggles’ against the demonic. However, warrior imagery is never
applied to Christ or the Holy Spirit. Jesus arrives as a helpless babe and is
described as gentle.79 He teaches love for enemies, prayer for persecutors,80
and willingly submits to death. And he drives out demons by the ‘finger’ or
‘Spirit’ of God, not by warfare.81 Even in apocalyptic passages, it is the
angels who battle, not Christ.82 The Holy Spirit is never described with
warfare metaphors; instead images of wind,83 breath,84 dove,85 and even
76 Walter Wink is the best known contemporary scholar who takes this approach
(Naming the Powers, Unmasking the Powers, Engaging the Powers [Philadelphia: Fortress
Press, 1984]).
77 Boyd, Satan, pp. 215-16.
78 Christian Breuninger makes a similar point: ‘evangelicalism, having been shaped by
the secularizing effects of Western rationalism, has ironically, helped create a craving for an
experiential spirituality that an evangelical hermeneutic is often unable to satisfy’ (‘Where
Angels Fear to Tread: Appraising the Current Fascination with Spiritual Warfare’, Covenant
Quarterly 53 [1995], pp. 37-43).
79 Matthew 11.29.
80 Matthew 5.44.
81 Matthew 12.28; Lk. 11.20.
82 E.g. Rev. 12.7-9.
83 E.g. Gen. 1.2; Exod. 14.21; Jn 3.8; Acts 2.2.
84 E.g. Job 27.3; 32.8; 34.14; Pss. 18.15; 33.6; Jn 20.22.
85 Matthew 3.16; Mk. 1.10; Lk. 3.22; Jn 1.32.
290 E.J. Warren / Journal of Pentecostal Theology 21 (2012) 278–297
‘silence’86 are used. Theologian Michael Welker specifically notes that the
Spirit is ‘anything but a Spirit of war’ or ‘military enthusiasm’; he is ‘not a
spirit of war, but delivers out of distress and helplessness as a Spirit of
righteousness and mercy’.87
Warfare imagery may result in an overly dualistic worldview. Although
most popular writers emphasize the supremacy of Christ over demons, and
scholars are careful to state that they do not endorse metaphysical dual-
ism,88 warfare imagery lends itself to a view of a battle between two equal
and opposite forces. The Bible does depict some degree of limited cosmic
dualism, but this does not necessitate an interpretation of ‘spiritual war-
fare’. This ‘dualism’ incorporates shades of gray, which most writers neglect.
The biblical portrayal of evil is a complex interplay between human sin
and diabolic evil, trials as a result of divine will and suffering due to
demonic infliction, human responsibility and human innocence. The dual-
ism of warfare imagery also has implications regarding the sovereignty of
God and the ontology of evil spirits. If God is pitted against a ‘formidable
foe’,89 he has to expend much effort in the battle. If Christians are called to
wage war, the enemy must be considerable. Yet God expels evil from his
good creation with merely a word, or a finger.90 Demons are typically por-
trayed as insignificant next to God and sometimes not quite real.91 Many
scholars who affirm the reality of evil spirits nevertheless seek to minimize
their ontology. Karl Barth employs this approach with his famous and con-
fusing term ‘nothingness’,92 which exists in ‘opposition and resistance to
God’s world-dominion’ and is a malignant, perverse entity, equated with
darkness, evil, chaos, demons, and Hades.93 Although nothingness lacks
86 1 Kings 19.12, 13. This story particularly emphasizes the non-violence of the Spirit; he is
found not in the wind or the earthquake but in silence.
87 Michael Welker, God the Spirit (Trans. John F. Hoffmeyer; Minneapolis: Fortress, 1994),
pp. 54-57. Admittedly, there are some examples of the wind/Spirit of God inciting war (Judg.
3.10; 6.34; 14.6, 19). However, as Welker notes, the Spirit is only ever indirectly involved in
violence, the result of which liberates God’s people (God the Spirit, pp. 52–60).
88 Boyd notes that biblical dualism is provisional and transitory (God at War, pp. 228,
230).
89 Boyd, God at War, p. 94.
90 E.g. Pss. 18.15; 104.7; 106.9; Mt. 17.18; Mk. 1.25; 9:24; Lk. 11.20.
91 E.g. 1 Cor. 8.4-6; Rev. 9.20.
92 The German, das Nichtige, implies nihil, null, or non-existence. The editors chose
‘nothingness’ with the proviso that its meaning is as explained by Barth (Church Dogmatics
III.3. [Trans. G. W. Bromiley, R. J. Ehrlich. T&T Clark: Edinburgh, 1960], p. 289, hereafter
abbreviated CD).
93 Barth, CD III.3, pp. 289, 352, 523.
E.J. Warren / Journal of Pentecostal Theology 21 (2012) 278–297 291
ontological status, Barth claims that nothingness, sin, evil, death, the devil,
and hell are very real.94 Many contemporary theologians have adopted var-
iations on this theme in their demonology. For example, Nigel Wright com-
pares evil with a black hole or a vacuum, having only parasitic existence.95
Warfare imagery, with its implicit dualism, runs the risk of giving demons a
status and power that they do not have. Evil is perhaps best viewed as para-
sitic on God’s good creation. This approach diminishes the ontology of evil
spirits without dismissing or demythologizing them.
There is room for further research regarding evil spirits from a theologi-
cal perspective. Incorporating multiple biblical passages and considering
the role of the Holy Spirit may provide further insight into the demonic
world and its effects on our world. Furthermore, incorporating non-
warfare images may provide a more balanced theology with respect to the
ontology of evil and the sovereignty of God.
2.4. Psycho-social
106 E.g. Ps. 106. 35-9; Isa. 34.14; Jer. 2.23; 19.13; Ezek. 23.30.
107 Deut. 32.17; Lev. 18.21; 20.2-5; Ps. 106.36-8. See Baruch A. Levine, In the Presence of the
Lord: A Study of Cult and some Cultic Themes in Ancient Israel (SJLA, 5; Leiden: Brill, 1974),
pp. 63, 75, 77; Philip P. Jenson, Graded Holiness: A Key to the Priestly Conception of the World
(JSOTSup, 106; Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press, 1992), pp. 202-203.
108 Leviticus 16.6-10. Most scholars concur that Azazel is a demon, based on linguistic
and extra-biblical evidence. See Jacob Milgrom, Leviticus: A Book of Ritual and Ethics
(Continental Commentary; Minneapolis: Fortress, 2004), pp. 166-71.
109 Zechariah 3.1-5.
110 E.g. Mt. 12.43; Mk. 1.23-26; 5.2, 8; 9.25; Lk. 9.42.
111 E.g. Mt. 10.8; 15.22, 28; Mk. 1.34; 9.25-7; Lk. 6.18; 9.42, Acts 5.16. John Christopher
Thomas points out that healing and exorcism are often blurred (The Devil, Disease and
294 E.J. Warren / Journal of Pentecostal Theology 21 (2012) 278–297
the unclean spirit who is evicted but returns with seven others when the
house is cleaned is also informative.112 We can conceptualize deliverance
in terms of holy housekeeping rather than warfare.113 Demons have been
compared with infectious agents such as viruses and parasites. Rather than
waging war on evil spirits, our ministry can focus on cleansing, disinfect-
ing, and healing people afflicted with demonic beings. Cleansing meta-
phors are less dualistic, minimize demonic ontology and perhaps better
incorporate the roles of Christ and the Holy Spirit.
Second, we could consider metaphors of space, boundaries, and order.
Instead of waging war on demons, we could focus on putting them in their
proper place and setting limits on evil. As discussed above, creation can be
viewed as the imposition of order on chaos. It involves separating and lim-
iting evil: the sea (symbolic of evil in the ancient world)114 is rebuked and
assigned a limit, a boundary that it may not pass;115 darkness is not created
but separated from light.116 Barth, among others, emphasizes the delimita-
tion of evil in creation; he states that God pushes back chaos ‘outside the
limits of the world willed and determined by Him’.117 Similarly Jesus’ minis-
try involves placing boundaries on evil. By returning demons to where they
belong (the sea or the abyss),118 Jesus reestablishes order. At the eschaton,
Satan and his followers are sent into the pit or the lake of fire,119 and sin-
ners are sent to the outer darkness.120 There is spatial separation between
good and evil in the past, present, and future. Boundary and purity meta-
phors also interrelate. The Azazel ritual involves both cleansing and order-
ing (sin is sent to the wilderness, the realm of demons). Housecleaning can
also involve tidying, putting things in place. Our ministry to the demonized
can be viewed as setting boundaries on evil. This applies well to counseling,
Deliverance: Origins of Illness in New Testament Thought [JPTSup, 13; Sheffield: Sheffield
Academic Press, 1998], pp. 157, 174, 199, 204, 249).
112 Matthew 12.43-45; Lk. 11.24-26.
113 I have used this metaphor with a demonized patient, encouraging her not to ‘make a
nice home’ for the demons.
114 Yam, Hebrew for ‘sea’, is almost identical to Yamm, a Canaanite sea monster. See
Levenson, Persistence of Evil, pp. 17, 47, 121-3.
115 Job 38.10,11; Pss. 104.7-9; 106.9; Prov. 8.27-9; Isa. 50.2; Jer. 5.22; Nah. 1.4.
116 Genesis 1.2, 4.
117 Barth, CD III.1, p. 102, also pp. 108, 122, 133, 142, and CD III.3, p. 352. See also Ronald
Simkins (Creator and Creation [Peabody, MA: Hendrickson, 1994]) and Michael Welker
(Creation and Reality, [Trans. John F. Hoffmeyer; Minneapolis: Fortress, 1999]).
118 Luke 8.31-33.
119 Revelation 20.3, 10.
120 Matthew 8.12; 22.13; 25.30.
E.J. Warren / Journal of Pentecostal Theology 21 (2012) 278–297 295
4. Conclusions