Partisanship is a work of the flesh.

In Paul’s list of works of the flesh in Galatians, one of the words he used is ἐριθεῖαι/epitheíe. The King James Version translates it as “strife;” the ESV went with “rivalries,” and the NIV and NASB with “selfish ambition.” I translate it “partisanship.”

No, I didn’t translate it this way because I wanna rebuke partisanship, and needed a bible verse to back me up. I got it out of Greek dictionaries when I translated this Galatians passage years ago. I’ll quote ’em for you. My Liddell-Scott-Jones lexicon has this:

ἘΡΙ̅ΘΕΊΑ epiθ'eɪ.ɑ noun. Labor for wages. Hesychius, “Lexicography”

2. Canvassing for public office. Intriguing. Aristotle, “Politics.”

3. Selfish or factious ambition. Jm 3.14, Pp 1.17 Intrigues, party squabbles. Ga 5.20

Joseph H. Thayer has this in his lexicon:

eritheias (eritheuō to spin wool, work in wool, Heliodorus 1.5 middle in the same sense; Tb 2.11 used of those who electioneer for office, courting popular applause by trickery and low arts; Aristotle, “Politics” 5.3 the verb is derived from erithos working for hire, a hireling; from the Maced. age down, a spinner or weaver, a worker in wool; Is 38.12 LXX a mean, sordid fellow), electioneering or intriguing for office; Aristotle 5.2-3 hence apparently in the New Testament a courting distinction, a desire to put oneself forward, a partisan and factious spirit which does not disdain low arts; partisanship, factiousness; Jm 3.14, 16, Pp 1.16, 2.3 Ignatius “Philadelphians” 8 equivalent to contending against God. Ro 2.8, 2Co 12.20, Ga 5.20

Lastly a contemporary Greek teacher, William D. Mounce:

the service of a party, party spirit; feud, faction; 2Co 12.20 contentious disposition, selfish ambition; Ga 5.20, Pp 1.17, 2.3, Jm 3.14 by impl. untowardness, disobedience. Ro 2.8, Jm 3.16

The word was originally used to describe weavers. At some point in the past, weavers began to use their guild to influence city politics—and were willing to do anything it took to gain political power. So the word evolved to mean that instead. It means partisanship.

Galatians 5.19-21 KWL

19 Fleshly works are obvious in anyone who practices the following:

Promiscuity. Uncleanness. Unethical behavior.

20 Idolatry. Addiction. Hatred. Rabble-rousing.

Too much zeal. Anger. Partisanship. Separatism. Heresy.

21 Envy. Intoxication. Constant partying.

And other people like these.

I warn you of them just like I warned you before:

Those who do such things won’t inherit God’s kingdom.

Of course partisans are gonna seriously be in denial about this. Which is why they tell me, “It only says partisanship because you made it say that,” and point to other translations they like much better. Translations which imply it’s totally okay for them to be partisan!

Okay… but in those other translations it says “strife,” “rivalries,” and “selfish ambition.” Don’t partisans regularly do that stuff too?

Partisanship seeks power over others.

Paul listed partisanship among the works of the flesh because that’s what it is, and always has been—whether you knew that’s what the word meant or not.

It’s about the pursuit of power, rather than surrendering all power to God. It’s about our power-seeking faction, going to war against all the other factions, instead of making peace, coming to terms, and trying to see what might benefit everyone. We call the politicians who seek the greater good statesmen, because they put the state above their party. It’s rare when politicians do that; it’s always been rare, no matter what people claim about how depraved the world’s been getting.

Statesmanship is a virtue, but partisans are trying to convince as many people as possible that statesmen are suckers—people who don’t really believe in the things they claim are principles, and have compromised them, or have been swindled by the opposition. Making peace isn’t a virtue to these folks. They may claim it is, ’cause they know what Jesus says in the Beatitudes, but they’re trying their darnedest to convince their supporters it’s false peace. Just you wait; it’s gonna come back to bite us.

Ultimately they don’t believe in peace at all. The other party is the enemy, and they’re at war. And if they fear they’re not winning, their war tactics will get increasingly fleshly, sinful, and destructive.

• At first they’ll say, “Fight with words and ideas all you want, but at the end of the day, drop all that and let’s be friends; it’s not personal, it’s just politics.”
• Then they won’t drop all that. The war continues after business hours.
• Then it will get personal. With attacks on their enemies’ character. With calls to have their political enemies impeached and jailed—and not because they’ve actually broken the law; any excuse will do.
• Then it’ll no longer be a fight with words and ideas. Guns will get involved. Riots will happen. Open warfare will happen.

When they feel they’re not winning, partisans are fine with escalating things into open warfare. Anything they can do to gain power; and I do mean anything.

Partisanship was never really about the words and ideas anyway. It’s about power. The words and ideas can change—and regularly will—so long that the party holds power. Many factions aren’t even about words and ideas; they’re a cult of personality, following a particular leader who changes his mind as he pleases, and his worshipers will follow.

And thus far I’ve been talking about political parties, but it certainly isn’t limited to that. A religious movement, a labor movement, a civil-rights movement, a community organization, a book club; anything can be turned into a group which seeks power for power’s sake, and stops at nothing to get it.

Because humans are selfish creatures, power corrupts. The quest for power, or the drive to hold onto one’s power, also corrupts. People are willing to do absolutely anything to get that power: Lie, steal, kill; mass murder and genocide have taken place throughout human history, and always because people sought power, and felt it was a moral right for them to wipe their enemies off the face of the earth. Heck, they even used bible to justify it: The LORD had the Hebrews wipe out certain Canaanite cities, and if that was acceptable, why can’t we do it again?

Because of this willingness—even eagerness!—to murder, political groups throughout history were always met with violent force. Still are: Even in the United States, plenty of people think it’s perfectly okay to punch a Nazi. It surely is tempting sometimes. And in some countries, they’re met with deadly force, as the faction in power tries to purge their political opponents. It’s a relatively new idea for there to be multiple opposition parties which don’t deteriorate into civil war. (Of course, I’m assuming the current enmity in the United States between our parties won’t do that. It may happen yet.)

In contrast, Christians aren’t meant to pursue power, but surrender it to God.

Christians who don’t wanna surrender to God.

Not every Christian recognizes we’re meant to live lives of humble submission, following Jesus, asking for the Holy Spirit’s guidance and permission before we do as we please. Many actually think we don’t need to: Once we receive the Spirit, they imagine his fruit will spontaneously grow in us, and every choice we make will automatically be godly. Which is crap, but it’s mighty popular crap.

And I’ve known many a politically-minded Christian who’s gone full partisan precisely because they believe this crap. If they have “the mind of Christ,” they know best! The other party doesn’t. Which means the other party is antichrist—and we should be fighting antichrists, shouldn’t we?

These folks have been really vocal and active in Evangelical and Catholic churches, and convinced quite a lot of us, “Hey, we need to take back our country for God!” (As if it ever really followed God to begin with, but civic idolaters in every country have written plenty of semi-fictional history books which make it look like every land consists of God’s chosen people.) How do we take back the country for God? Duh; join their party. Vote for their candidates. Get out the vote. Fight the opposition by any means necessary. It’s okay to vandalize their signs, burglarize their headquarters, slander their candidates, and undermine entire elections if it looks like they might win; it’s for God!

What about surrender? Oh, we can do that once the political fight’s over, assuming it’ll ever be over. Meanwhile we’re contending for the soul of our nation. It’s a spiritual war. You gotta fight!

The fighting—and the fleshly behavior which goes right along with the fighting—should be rather obvious evidence we’re not talking about the Spirit’s fruit whatsoever. None of this stuff produces love, peace, kindness, patience, nor grace. On the contrary it mocks those Christians who object to the partisanship, who dare to show these traits towards political enemies. You can’t love the president if you’re trying to get him impeached. You can’t give opposition-party senators the benefit of the doubt when you want them to fail. Nothing in politics produces the Spirit’s fruit. Anyone who tries to find an exception to that statement, has some really iffy definitions of any “fruit” they claim they find.

You will regularly find partisan Christians are the least fruitful Christians you’ve ever met. Because they just hate so many people. They hate their political opponents. They might jokingly claim they’re just showing ’em “tough love,” but nope, it’s hatred. Hatred’s a work of the flesh too y’know. And when you hate people, you feel no need to show ’em any grace.

I didn’t realize how big of a pitfall my own partisanship had become in my own life till I met a Christian in the opposition party… and saw a mirror-image version of myself. I was big-time into conservative issues; she was big-time into liberal ones. And she hated conservatives. Hated hated hated. Hated like a fat guy hates kale.

Hated me—and waitaminnit, aren’t we both supposed to be on Team Jesus? But she was entirely sure anybody in my party couldn’t possibly be a real Christian. And y’know, that’s exactly what I’d heard fellow conservatives say about her party. I still hear partisans of every party say this.

The Holy Spirit is very good at taking advantage of these situations, and convinced me I needed to take a good hard look at my own partisanship. So I did. It’s not entirely gone; I’m still working on it. But it had to go. It was getting in the way of the gospel—as fleshly works will do.

And as Paul warned, those who do ’em don’t inherit the kingdom, so there’s that for Christians to worry about as well. Are we too partisan to be in Jesus’s party?