Is There a Moral and Religious Obligation to Let in Immigrants?

Would you please address the immigration problem where people moved into other countries without permission? Were they to obey the laws of the land and the king (president)? I don’t know about this, and many Christians have different views on this subject matter. My Pastor says we cannot take care of everyone that comes over from other countries. How does Scripture approach this?

Cheryl

Well, Cheryl, how about throwing us an easy one to start off the year? We’re just kidding, of course. When answers are obvious, there is no reason to ask the question.

We only can dip our toe into this complex issue, but we do think Scripture offers clarity. To start with, the Bible unequivocally acknowledges and celebrates there being a variety of nations. As our teaching, Tower of Power: Decoding the Secrets of Babel explains, after the Flood there was a proper division into nations. One of the flaws of the generation of the tower was attempting to erase the individuality of groups and people.

Scripture uses six distinct Hebrew terms for a “stranger” or “foreigner,” and they are not interchangeable. Each word carries a different legal, social, and moral status—a nuance that is often lost in translation. These are: ger, toshav, nochri, zar, ben-neichar, and oreach. The rights, obligations, and treatment of each is different but one thing is clear. No foreigner, refugee, or immigrant has only rights and no obligations.

The book of Joshua reveals more insights as we observe the children of Israel entering their land. The land of Israel is given to the Jewish people, though they inhabit it—and can be expelled from it—at God’s will depending on their behavior. When they are sovereign in the land, there are nations whose moral structures are in direct opposition to God’s will, and those nations cannot coexist in the same land. However, members of most nations are welcome in the land if they adhere to a clearly defined set of values known as the Seven Noahide laws. They are to be treated well, but they are not ‘of the people.’ Their rights are limited. Finally, those who choose to convert can do so upon which they become full members of the society.

Joshua 9 provides a fascinating account of this dynamic. Men from a neighboring area come to Joshua and ask permission to settle in the land then known as Canaan. However, they deceive Joshua by telling him that they come from far away. Fooled by their words, he pledges peace to them. Upon discovery that they had lied, he is still bound by his pledge. However, they do not go unpunished. They are relegated to being ‘drawers of water and hewers of wood,’ a low-level of society and economic opportunity. Joshua’s lack of discernment in not probing into the facts before making a promise is viewed as a black mark upon his life.

Obviously, there is not a direct correlation to modern countries today, but the broad principle stands. Countries have the obligation to protect their sovereignty and to set conditions for those who wish to live there. Being part of a nation is a privilege, not a right.

Let’s circle back to contemporary conditions. Many countries in Europe are on the verge of losing their cultural identities. Too many countries abandoned their own history and their patterns of life making them very susceptible to decline and decay. Massive legal and illegal immigration of people of other cultures who reject the host country’s values is vastly compounding the problem.

In the United States today there is an effort to correct the incursion of illegal and undocumented individuals as well as recognition that it was wrong to abandon demands that legal immigrants adhere to basic American principles. The self-effacing tendency of a culturally diffident host country to excuse crimes committed by foreigners, aliens, and immigrants as we saw with Pakistani grooming gangs in England, and with Somali welfare fraud in Minnesota, is clearly disastrous.

At the same time, of course, the host country’s law enforcement must conduct its operations in good faith. Our assumption is that most employees of ICE are good and honest people. Their mission should be clear as should the way they carry out that mission. If there is a rogue individual who steps outside of the boundaries of the law, he must be stopped and prosecuted. Yet it makes no more sense to demand the end of the entity than it does to demand that we close all public schools when a teacher is found molesting a student. In both cases, tighter supervision and clearer expectations are needed, but the conclusion cannot be that border enforcement or education is unnecessary.

We agree with your pastor that a government’s first responsibility is the survival of that country. Just as a lifeboat that takes on too many people will capsize leading to everyone drowning, no country can take in everyone who wants to come. We must live in reality, not in a utopian pipe dream. When countries are flourishing socially and economically, they can accept more immigrants. When they are weak and struggling, their primary energy must go to restoring their own health. The best way to ensure being open to immigrants is to have a strong economy, a patriotic and committed citizenship, and clearly delineated definitions of what it means to be a member of that culture. The more internal division and lack of clarity a country faces, the less capable it is of absorbing more people.

We hope this gives you a starting point,

Rabbi Daniel and Susan Lapin

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