–– Ntumba Katabua

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Genesis 4 records the world’s first murder.  Brother against brother. Xenophobic attacks and acts of intimidation against African and Asian migrants in parts of South Africa have surfaced again. Xenowatch reports a total of 697 deaths in South Africa over the last 30 years, related to xenophobia.

The Merriam-Webster Dictionary defines xenophobia as a “fear and hatred of strangers or foreigners or of anything that is strange or foreign.”

Sociologists and politicians often trace xenophobia back to rivalry over limited resources such as jobs, housing, and social services. Here are three reasons this symptom-level sociological analysis offers an unsatisfactory explanation:  

1. Firstly, the biggest flaw in the argument lies in the fact that poor South Africans are not attacking each other with similar veracity.  This violence is selectively directed at Asian and African foreigners, which cannot be explained by poverty alone – it requires a separate logic.
2. Secondly, the destruction of immigrant-owned commercial merchandise and the denial of access to healthcare and schooling for immigrants do not promise to relieve the socio-economic condition of the aggrieved locals. 
3. Finally, other countries such as India and Brazil also suffer from deep poverty, large informal settlements, and mass internal and external migration – yet lack this violent expression of animosity towards immigrants.  Poverty alone cannot explain this violence.

From a biblical perspective, xenophobia has the same pathology as racism—it is the cocktail of envy, hate, and slander. It is not the innocent admiration of another’s prosperity. Rather, it is the active deprivation of another’s good and another’s welfare.   

• Musyimi characterises envy as a self-centred devotion which delights in another’s harm.  It goes something like “if I am struggling to make ends meet in my own country, what gives a foreign national the right to come here and do better than me?”  And it causes one to loot and destroy the commercial merchandise of another.  As we learn from the case of the two prostitutes appealing to King Solomon for a judgment in 1 Kings 3:26, envy says, “If I cannot have it, you cannot have it either”.
• Slander seeks to do injury to another through prejudice, and the Bible categorises those who do so as fools—those who reject wisdom (Proverbs 10:18). Sure, in any population in a fallen world, there are bound to be undesirable elements.  But is it fair to indiscriminately characterise all black immigrants as criminals and drug dealers?  That is as slanderous as calling all South Africans xenophobes. The mass misrepresentation of African and Asian foreigners—documented or not—as thieves, pests, and drug-dealers is slander that has deadly ramifications.
• Hatred leads to dehumanisation and murder (1 John 3:15).  Those vulnerable migrants are seen by the protestors as less than human.  Denying access to healthcare to a pregnant mother or a critically ill patient simply because they are a foreigner is not law enforcement nor patriotism—it is dehumanisation that is bred from hatred. 

It is undeniable that economic deprivation gives occasion for discontentment, and discontentment leads to collective frustration. Any honest observer would see that the frustration felt by citizens is ultimately directed at the State for its failure to regulate migration and deliver the promised “better life for all.”  Yet, “violence entrepreneurs” deliberately exploit this frustration by developing false narratives and inciting crowds to hate and launch attacks on selected migrants.  

Biblical worldview

The biblical worldview has much to say about how we ought to relate to strangers and sojourners. In Leviticus 19:33-34, God instructed His people, the Jews, not to harm the sojourner but to treat them fairly (Leviticus 24:22)

For the host citizens – empathy, compassion and activism

For the individual, there remains a moral obligation to regard each person as an image-bearer of God (Gen. 9:6), valuable and befitting of dignified treatment. 

The parable of the good Samaritan (Luke 10:30-37) is instructive.  Jews and Samaritans historically had irreconcilable differences and had no dealings between them (John 4:9).  They saw each other as enemies.  Yet, in that parable taught by Jesus, the Samaritan extended compassion to his Jewish neighbour and did what was necessary to ensure his welfare.  

The call to love our neighbour (Luke 10:27) is not contingent on ethnicity, national borders, or immigration status, but on the fact that we’re all made in the image of God.

For the immigrant

Paul writes, “Every person is to be in subjection to the governing authorities. For there is no authority except from God, and those which exist are established by God. Therefore, whoever resists the authorities has opposed the ordinance of God, and they who have opposed will receive condemnation upon themselves” (Romans 13:1–2).   

While the foreigner can expect to be treated with dignity, he has a moral obligation to respect the laws of his host.  Blatant disregard of local laws should deprive one of their right to be in that country.

For the South African government 

Romans 13:3-4 teaches that governing authorities must rule justly—protect the law-abiding citizens and punish the lawless. On the one hand, it has a moral imperative to enforce its own immigration laws to protect inhabitants from external threats; and on the other hand, it must clamp down on all lawlessness without partiality (Numbers 15:15-16)—and that includes those who undermine legal entry as well as those who participate in acts of vigilantism. 

The lack of prosecution for xenophobic violence—despite those acts being documented, filmed and broadcast – only serves to embolden perpetrators.  The Government should not bear the sword in vain (Rom. 13:4).  Revelations of the Madlanga Commission reveal deep dysfunction within institutions entrusted with maintaining law and order.   An honest government has a lot of introspection to do.

Virgil Walker said it well, “Moreover, as we acknowledge that illegal immigration is a violation of the law, we must not lose sight of the humanity inherent in these immigrants. (…) This necessitates a form of response from both the government and its citizens that safeguards the rights of all, upholds the rule of law, and embodies compassion and grace.”  (Virgil Walker)

Genesis 4:10 “Your brother’s blood is crying to Me from the ground.”