Peace: From sword to plowshare — the journey from destruction to building

Source: The prophetic vision: When the sword becomes a plowshare

"He will judge between the nations and arbitrate for many peoples. They will hammer their swords into plowshares and their spears into pruning hooks, nation will not raise a sword against nation, and they will no longer learn war."

(Isaiah 2:4)

Explanation: A metamorphosis of energy: From destruction to growth

This is one of the most famous verses in the Bible, describing the end of days. The prophet Isaiah presents a vision in which war does not just disappear, but undergoes a metamorphosis. The weapons (swords and spears) are not destroyed, but reworked into agricultural tools (plowshares and pruning hooks). The energy that was invested in destruction will from now on be invested in building and growth.

Perspective: Peace as destiny: Between human nature and prophetic vision

Is peace a natural state or a miracle? The philosopher Thomas Hobbes (whom we encountered last week) argued that the state of nature is war. Isaiah agrees with him in a sense—the present world is full of wars. But Isaiah's innovation is that peace is humanity's destiny. Notice that the prophet does not eliminate nations ("nation will not raise a sword against nation"); that is, peace does not require everyone to be the same, but requires peoples to stop seeing one another as a threat and to resolve disputes through law and justice ("He will judge between the nations"), rather than by force of arms.

Going Deeper: A modern perspective: The true cost of the arms race

"Every gun that is made, every warship launched, every rocket fired signifies, in the final sense, a theft from those who hunger and are not fed, those who are cold and are not clothed. This world in arms is not spending money alone. It is spending the sweat of its laborers, the genius of its scientists, the hopes of its children." (Dwight D. Eisenhower, "The Chance for Peace" address, 1953)

Eisenhower was no naive pacifist; he was the Supreme Allied Commander in Europe during World War II, and later President of the United States. It was precisely he, who knew war firsthand, who offered the most precise modern interpretation of Isaiah's vision to hammer swords into plowshares.

Eisenhower argues that even in peacetime (the Cold War), the very holding of weapons is a tragedy. Every dollar that goes to a tank is a dollar that does not go to a school or a hospital. It is a "zero-sum game"—the sword always comes at the expense of the plowshare.

Culture: The sculpture, the vision, and the irony: Isaiah at UN headquarters

This verse from Isaiah is inscribed on the "Isaiah Wall" across from the United Nations building in New York. Yet the historical irony is that for decades, the superpowers seated inside that very building waged the greatest arms race in history.

In the UN sculpture garden stands a colossal bronze statue titled "Let Us Beat Swords into Plowshares," a work by Soviet sculptor Evgeny Vuchetich depicting a muscular man striking a sword with a hammer to bend it into a tool. The sculpture symbolizes the physical, active effort required to make peace; peace does not happen on its own, it has to be "hammered out" with great toil. In the photo: Evgeny Vuchetich's sculpture depicting a man transforming a sword into a plowshare, on display at United Nations headquarters in New York.