The Bible in Politics
Robert Myles Dean of Research and Associate Professor of New Testament, Wollaston Theological College, University of Divinity
People often say religion and politics shouldn’t mix, but this hasn’t stopped politicians from using the Bible to support their agendas. So, who really gets to lay claim to scripture?
The Bible is frequently thrown around as a prop in contemporary politics. In June 2020, US President Donald Trump quite literally brandished a Bible as a prop when he took a photo op after having law enforcement clear protestors from Lafayette Square opposite the White House. To use the Bible in this way is to claim a piece of its authority and to harness some of its enduring power. Such uses of the Bible can have significant payoff among certain constituencies and is done on all sides of politics.
Scholars of the Bible who have studied its reception in contemporary politics - including in countries like the UK, USA, Norway, Aotearoa New Zealand, and Australia - often speak of different ‘Bibles’ at play. Each of these ‘Bibles’ claim to represent what the Bible really means, but they’re often based on a shallow reading of selected passages.
For example, in 2021, former US Vice President Kamala Harris came under scrutiny when she said that getting vaccinated was ‘the very essence of what the Bible and so many faiths tell us, in the importance of our role and our power when we say, ‘Love thy neighbour’.’ While vaccination is important, it’s a bit of rhetorical overreach to assert that the ‘very essence’ of the Bible is really about vaccination. This shows how politicians will sometimes invoke the Bible to support their own agendas, regardless of whether it’s entirely accurate.
In Australia, there are at least three different ways the Bible gets deployed in political discourse: culturally, to uphold the democratic-establishment, and as a radical critique of power.
The Cultural Bible refers to the idea that the Bible underpins Western society and culture. This invocation assumes that the Bible is part of our great literary heritage and is important for understanding Western civilisation and cultural identity, irrespective of personal religious beliefs. Meredith Lake in her book The Bible in Australia: A Cultural History (2018) suggests that while the Bible is not, of course, inherently Western, ‘the Bible’s potency in Australia, and the longevity of its influence, has stemmed partly from its European – and more specifically its British – cultural associations and credentials’ due in large part to the legacy of colonisation (pp10-11).
The Democratic-Establishment Bible goes further than the Cultural Bible by suggesting that the Bible upholds modern democratic values like free speech, individual conscience, justice, law, consensus, tolerance, and rights. Furthermore, despite coming from a completely different political and cultural world, the Bible is sometimes believed to lay the foundation for our entire modern Western system of laws and government. Something of this use could be at play in Australian politician Peter Dutton’s somewhat vague claim in his 2024 Easter Message that Jesus’ ‘values of service and humility, gratitude and forgiveness, tolerance and love have shaped democratic nations and peoples, including our own country, our institutions and our national character.’
On the other hand, the Radical Bible suggests the Bible is really about revolutionary transformation. The Radical Bible promotes values and actions like political liberation, the redistribution of wealth, confronting abuses of power, and siding with the poor and oppressed. In Australia, the Palm Sunday marches for refugee justice exemplify this, with participants displaying signs with Bible verses like Hebrews 13:2: ‘Do not neglect to show hospitality to strangers, for by doing that some have entertained angels without knowing it’. While the broader context of this passage suggests hospitality is envisioned among Christ believers only - Hebrews does not recommend a general love of humankind, but a ‘mutual affection’ of brothers and sisters - such interpretive details are of little concern. The crux here as elsewhere lies in how the Bible’s authority is being harnessed to bolster various political agendas, which, despite their shared reliance on scripture, are often at odds with one another.
Learn more about the use and abuse of the Bible in contemporary politics by coming along to a Doing Theology Together Day led by Wollaston’s Dr Megan Warner and Associate Professor Robert Myles on Saturday 3 May 2025 at St George’s Cathedral.
Further details at www.wollaston.edu.au/events or email info@wollaston.edu.au.